Royal Guard
by Hikaru Irving
Summary: Ves/Abyss, spoilers. Luke's job was supposed to be simple: track down the princess and return her to the capital. It had gotten much more complicated since Yuri Lowell entered the picture.
1. Simple Isn't Easy

A/N: Writer's block sucks. To the max.

Disclaimer: Don't own, blah blah blah blah.

--

It just wasn't fair. Luke was only doing his job. And yet this guy, this criminal, this—Yuri Lowell—had to make it ten times harder than it already was! Sometimes he just wanted to sit down and cry himself hoarse. It wasn't easy to be an Imperial Knight, a Zaphias noble, and captain of the bloody Royal Guard at that. And because of his rank, Alexei had to drive him that much harder. He'd have gone insane years ago if he hadn't had his friend and servant Guy to talk to. That, and his diary, journal, log, whatever one wanted to call it. Writing helped Luke think. If he could think, he could handle whatever Yuri wanted to throw at him or shove down his throat the next day. It had been so simple before Yuri was involved.

Alexei had mobilized the Royal Guard when both heirs to the imperial throne had gone missing: Ioder and Estellise. Ioder had been found, and Estellise had been sighted but never returned to the hands of the Knights, to the cradle of Zaphias. Thus it had become Luke's mission as Royal Guard captain to track down the missing Princess and escort her back to the castle, where many felt she belonged. Luke wasn't so sure he agreed. Prior to his inclusion in the Imperial Knights, he had been locked up in his own manor in a similar fashion in the royal quarter of the capital city. He had broadened his horizons so much after he had joined the Knights, just as Estellise was doing now.

However, despite his personal feelings on the matter, Luke had a job to do, and that was getting the Princess to safety at least. That meant keeping her out of the wilds. Without a barrier, monsters gathered in great packs, with ferociousness tending to be greater with bigger numbers. Monsters were called monsters for a reason. Though Luke had most of the entire Guard with him on this mission, it had not required that much force to track down the princess. Tracking her down had been easy. It was reclaiming her that was the tough part.

They had caught her trail in Capua Nor, then Torim, where Luke had met with the lieutenant in the harbor, Flynn Scifo. After a stern talking to from Luke to Flynn (how could an Imperial Knight have let the princess go, in the hands of a common criminal no less!), the Royal Guard had left Torim Harbor in hot pursuit of the princess. Unfortunately, they lost her trail in the woods near Heliord, and Captain Cumore had been credited with the recapture of the Princess. Cumore and Schwann both, though the second had been a bit belated.

In Heliord, Alexei himself had insisted that Estellise return to the capital, to which she had agreed. At this Luke thought his job would be simply to escort the lady back to the castle. Not so. Never before had Luke's life been harder. No, the imperial mage Rita Mordio had been assigned to investigate the forest of Keiv Moc to look at something called an aer krene. The mage was to go on her own or with companions, whichever, but the princess insisted on accompanying her. Alexei then pulled Luke and a part of the Royal Guard to guard the mage and princess. Well, Luke thought then, a bit of a detour, but nothing he couldn't handle. Until Yuri Lowell entered the equation.

"I never asked for this. You're pushing this on me!" Yuri had said, but Luke couldn't hope but wonder if it had been premeditated. For some reason unknown to Luke (even when Alexei had said it had been because Yuri had once aspired to join the Imperial Knights), Yuri was allowed to tag along, to help guard the princess. Luke had not approved, since Yuri was a criminal, pardoned by royalty or not, but he did think that Yuri was an okay guy. Only Yuri seemed to think Luke was something sinister, and tormented him to no end.

Just like that day at dinner. It was raining. Dinner was cold. They were all huddled under whatever cover they had, which consisted not of trees, since they tended to act as natural lightning rods during a storm. Shivering under their blankets and cloaks, choking down cold cuts under the feeble light of a guttering lantern, Yuri had noticed something Luke was doing.

"Hey, Captain. Whatcha got there?"

Luke had tried to brush it off. "Nothing important."

Not bothered by the rain, Yuri had walked up to Luke, and with a nonchalant flick of his wrist repossessed what Luke had been holding—a book with blank pages, filled almost halfway with ink. Yuri's eyes danced with delight.

"Oh man, this is rich."

"Give it back! Jeez, really, why would you—"

Interest piqued, the others of the group inquired. First he heard Karol.

"What is it, Yuri? I wanna see!"

Rita scoffed, "So it's a diary. Men keep diaries too. Big whoop. I bet there's nothing interesting in there."

To which Luke's heart sank. True enough, there wasn't anything out of ordinary in his journal, just his thoughts and feelings as he went about being captain of the Royal Guard. There were bits about his worrying about finding the princess and whether or not she'd come back to the capital, but that was the bulk of it.

So praise be to whatever deity there was when Estellise came to his rescue.

"Yuri, give it back to him. Reading someone's diary is the greatest invasion of privacy anyone can commit! Luke's entitled to keep his thoughts private unless he wishes to voice them."

Luke could have sung with joy. He clapped his hands, a silly smile plastered on his face.

"Listen to the lady, for once."

But Yuri shook his head, granite eyes scanning the freshly inked pages with a great interest.

"Seems like Alexei wants an apatheia, too. Might help to figure out why if we knew what this apatheia was."

Alarmed, Luke snatched his journal out of Yuri's clutches. A slight blush was upon his face. Alexei had given him additional orders to procure apatheia if any were to be found, but Lady Estellise had always been top priority. The only leads on apatheia he had gotten so far was that it was supposedly a powerful blastia core, but investigations even with Alexei's Royal Guard authority turned up nothing. It was Imperial Knight business anyway!

"You mean that thing Raven said he was looking for at Ragou's palace?" Karol asked, his head tilted to one side. Yuri nodded.

"If the Knights want one and Raven's guild wants one, makes me wonder what it really is. Powerful blastia core is kinda vague."

"Leave it alone!" Luke said vehemently, brow knit together. "It's Imperial Knight business."

To this Yuri gave an amused smirk. "Fine. Speaking of Imperial Knight—you know Flynn?"

Luke absently wondered if Yuri was simply immune to the rain instead of just not bothered by it. He just stood there in the downpour without his blanket, getting thoroughly soaked, although even with layers of cloaks and blankets everyone else was soaked through too. He shrugged. "A bit. Why?"

"Oh, you just mentioned him in your diary, that's all."

"Yeah. He let the princess get away when as a Knight it's his duty to ensure her safety."

"Yep. He knew she'd be safe with me."

Granite grey eyes locked with bright emerald. Yuri really rubbed Luke the wrong way, in more ways than one. Yet what could he do about it? At the moment at least, they were stuck together as long as the princess insisted on journeying with this lot. Luke sighed, rubbing his temple. Someone probably ought to just do the kind thing and put him out of his misery when they had a chance. Preferably someone who wouldn't be smiling manically when they did so.

Yuri finally sat back down and threw his blanket over his head, as if there was a point after he was soaked from the heavy rain. Repede, being an outdoors dog, never minded the elements, unless it was particularly hot or cold, or even snowing. He was curled up beside his master, that ridiculous pipe clenched between his teeth like always.

"I'm sorry, Luke." Estellise broke the silence. "I'm sorry I'm making your job so difficult. It's just … I want to continue the journey. I'm learning so much I'm amazed at how little I knew before."

Luke shook his head. "It's fine, Princess. I was in your shoes a few years ago myself."

"Ah." Yuri said, his damnable interest piqued once again. Didn't he get enough out of picking on Luke for just one day? "That reminds me. Aren't you a bit young to be Captain of the Royal Guard? That's Alexei's personal unit, isn't it?"

Luke nodded, too devoid of energy to put much into arguing with Yuri. "If there's one thing Alexei's good at, it's delegating responsibility. I was trained by an expert swordsman from a young age, and Alexei's always been impressed with the accomplishments of my family. House Fabre has done great things over the time since the Empire was founded."

"How old are you? Seventeen?"

"Yeah, if that."

Yuri quirked a brow at the phrase "if that," but he didn't remark on it. What he did remark on, however … "So he just appointed you because you're a noble. Tch. I thought even Alexei was better than that. Guess the majority of the Knights are fools that see only blood."

Luke's brow twitched. Although he wasn't as zealous of bloodlines as other nobles, he still felt honorably bound to his house, and Yuri's comment was like an insult to House Fabre. His family did do great things! His father was a duke, his mother was a duchess of royal descent, why should his accomplishments be any different?

"Who did train you though, Luke?" Estellise asked, and Luke was rather surprised at her for the inquiry. "I've never seen that style used in the Imperial Knights."

"No, he wasn't an Imperial Knight. You guys have heard of that theocracy built on that chain of islands in the middle ocean? It used to be part of the empire, but almost two decades ago it broke off."

"I've never heard of that." Rita said, folding her arms under her blanket. She didn't look very wet or cold; Luke secretly thought she might be using magic to keep herself above the weather. Karol rolled his eyes at her.

"Well, duh, Rita, that was before we were even born!" To which the mage cast a quick Stone Blast in Karol's direction. Cries of pain were heard throughout the camp site. Nobody so much as batted an eyelash; it was simply how things were between the mage and the boy.

"I read about it." Estellise said, her eyes lighting up whenever she recalled something she had read in the castle library. "The theocracy of Daath was founded upon the Padamiya island chain and included many cities, like Daath, Yulia City, Grand Chokmah, and many others. Its religion is an absolute prophecy called the Score and was the Empire's religion as well. Until the war almost two decades ago, it broke off from the Empire and thus stopped reading the Score for it."

"Exactly." Luke nodded at her. "Daath's Order of Lorelei has its own military branch, the Oracle Knights. The man who trained me was their Commandant, Van Grants. That's why you don't see any other Imperial Knights using this style."

"Really?" Yuri's voice had a peculiar tone of disbelief. "Why would a Commandant make time just for you?" It reminded him of how Commandant Alexei had set time aside just for Raven back at the prison, a lowly guildsman. The guilds and knights loathed each other. This whole thing kept getting fishier and fishier.

Luke shrugged his shoulders. "I don't know. But I'm glad for the training Master Van gave me. Without it, I wouldn't even be in the Imperial Knights today." He sighed, rubbing his temple. "And if that's all, I'll be trying to go to sleep. We still need to investigate that forest."

And for once since Luke had joined with the group, Yuri had no objection.

--

The forest of Keiv Moc had not turned out what they expected it to be, whatever they had expected it to be. They took the suspicious guildsman Raven into their fold, subdued the crazed packs of monsters that had attacked Dahngrest, and met that mysterious man, Duke. With a strange sword, he had cut through the aer, Rita had said, and calmed the krene, the spring from which aer had come. Too much aer was said to have a negative effect on living things, people, plants, and monsters alike. After they had seen the aer krene, evidence of the aer's effect was seen as the Don and his guilds chased the now docile beasts back to their dens.

To Luke it all meant next to nothing. Guild business was guild business, just like Imperial Knight business was Imperial Knight business. His job was to guard the princess, nothing more, nothing less. Until that Raven fellow pulled him aside when Yuri and the others went to go meet the Don in the Union Headquarters.

Dahngrest was a shady city, though it did have its own charms. Being in that same shade with the guildsman Raven made Luke just a little bit nervous. Though he fought and performed backflips and spoke with the flippancy of youth, his appearance up close was tired and haggard, as if he were ready to drop dead at any moment. Luke felt a chill run down his spine at the thought.

"So, Raven, was it? What do you want with me?"

The archer studied Luke up and down. He shrugged. "Oh, nothin' much. Just that … are you with them on the Commandant's orders?"

"What? Yeah, I'm here to protect the princess on Alexei's orders. What's it to you? Can't leave her alone with a criminal, pardoned or not."

Raven blinked, as if he were surprised. "Ah, Alexei's orders then? But still … doesn't it make you wonder? Why did he make you captain of his royal guard?"

The young noble narrowed his eyes, bright green turning poisonously dark. "Why does everyone keep asking me that … Look, I don't know, the best reasons I can come up with is that I'm good with a sword and from a noble family. It's as good an explanation as anything else."

Raven turned slightly, hands folded behind his head. The sunlight sifted through Dahngrest's barrier, making it appear like late afternoon although it was just after morning. The way the archer stood, he was half cast in light, half in shadow. Luke didn't know why, but he had a sudden thought the way the light fell on him was significant. Then Raven spoke.

"Really? No other reason? Maybe cuz of a certain … fonon?"

A chord of dread struck, rang through Luke's entire being. He took a half step back from Raven, spitting through grit teeth, "How do you know about that? I thought Daath kept knowledge about fonons to itself after it broke off from the Empire!"

Raven simply shrugged. "I'm an old man, old men don't forget easily. But still, Luke. If you knew that much about fonons, why did you accept Alexei's post? You do know how unstable the last fonon type is, after all."

All of the tutoring came back to Luke in an incomprehensible rush. Yes, he knew about fonons, the particles of sound that existed alongside aer and helped make up matter. Each fonon had a type, and each type had a characteristic and power. Mages used fonons in their magic extensively, but they had no idea they weren't using pure aer. The last type of fonon, the Seventh, was most powerful, and most unstable.

"Why not? I'm not a real Seventh Fonist. I'm just a knight. That's all."

Raven's eyes went wide, but only for a moment. He put a hand on Luke's shoulder and shook a few times, as if trying to break the Knight from a stupor. When Luke slapped his arm away, he gave up and sighed.

"I'm saying this fer yer own good, kid. Whatever Alexei has planned, it _does not _bode well for you. I was his pawn once, and it landed me in a place I'd never wish on hell's worst occupant. Just … snap outta it before it's too late."

With those last words, Raven disappeared in the city of Dahngrest.

--

A/N: There's a lot I can do with this. I just hope to keep it somewhat short, and to that end there will be much skipping around, with the assumption the reader has beaten at least Vesperia.


	2. All in a Knight's Work

A/ N: This story is fun so far :3 Poor Luke is so easy to make fun of.

--

Maybe it was just bad luck, or maybe that particular guy was bad luck. After Luke had spoken to Raven, he had simply walked into the Union Headquarters, and all hell had broken loose. The Don was howling for all out war with the empire, he had an Imperial messenger—who turned out to be none other than Flynn—thrown in the dungeon, and Luke suddenly felt very self conscious for the crimson Royal Guard uniform he happened to be wearing.

Fortunately, he had been able to remain unscathed, by attaching himself to the nearest corner out of the guildsmens' line of sight if nothing else. On their way out, Yuri had oh so eloquently dragged Luke along by the hair, which made it all the more painful because his hair was short. Damn, Yuri had a ridiculously strong grip.

"Jeez, you're Captain of the Royal Guard, and you're huddling in a corner?"

Wresting himself free of Yuri once they were out of the Headquarters, Luke spat, "Excuse me for not wanting to be in the guilds' warpath, which they conveniently got into the moment I walked in!" He rubbed the spot on his scalp where Yuri had pulled so hard. "And was that necessary?"

"Yep."

For the last seven years, Luke had been prone to getting headaches of intense pain, for reasons nobody understood. Now, he was of the opinion that the reason behind those headaches somehow must have been Yuri Lowell, for he felt such a pressure within his skull now. Groaning, he put a hand on his forehead.

Not two minutes after that fact, Yuri looked in his coat pocket, and his face fell. "Uh-oh. Must've dropped my wallet."

"At a time like this?" Karol exclaimed with wide brown eyes. Yuri only shrugged.

"It's prolly in the Don's place. I'll go get it."

Luke watched, astonished, as Yuri's companions simply took the story at face value as the man turned heel and waltzed back to the Union Headquarters. Really, now. The only real reason Yuri would go back in there when the Don was absent was also the only one that actually made sense. Yuri's best friend from childhood was locked up in there. The Royal Guard captain sighed.

"If he wants to go see Flynn, why can't he just say so?"

Estellise blinked. "What? He's going to see Flynn?"

"I figured that was a load, about losing his wallet." Rita smirked. She had been right, but not about the reason Yuri had made that up.

"Is that okay?" Karol asked, brow knit with worriment. "For Yuri to just go see the Don's prisoner?"

"He may get into trouble with the guild's guards …" Luke trailed off when Karol and Estellise were giving him strange looks. "What? What's wrong?"

Next thing heknew, the very princess he was supposed to be guarding right before a huge war was pushing him in the direction of the guild's Union Headquarters, well wishes and good lucks sung in his ear.

"Make sure he's okay for us!"

Then the door shut behind him. Luke almost growled; that was how annoyed he was. "Ugh. He's a grown man, he can take care of himself …" Nonetheless he shoved off. He had no idea where the cells were, but he caught a glimpse of Yuri disappearing behind a door that supiciously lacked a guard. Forboding thrummed in his head, or was that only his headache? It didn't matter.

The dungeon was, of course, dark, damp, and nearly empty. Prisoners of the Union had to be the ones who caused a serious amount of trouble for entire city of guilds as a whole, for individuals were normally punished by the guild whose laws governed him or her. Like Imperial Knights who delivered a letter from the crown prince promising hellish war.

Speaking of which—Luke could see where Flynn was caged, sitting upright with his back to the barred door. He and Yuri were talking, about what, Luke wasn't sure. He wasn't one to eavesdrop. It was none of his business anyway. He was, however, surprised when Yuri broke the lock on the cell door, and out was Flynn, faster than lightning. He didn't know if Flynn even saw him on his way out.

Yuri then did something that made Luke actually cringe. He walked into the cell previously occupied by Flynn, sat himself on the floor, and waited. It was understandable why Flynn had to go free—he had to find out whoever had sabotaged the prince's letter, and reclaim the right ones. Doing so would prevent war between the knights and the guilds. But …

"What the hell are you doing in there?" Luke asked, amazed. Yuri didn't even spare him a glance.

"Oh. You saw that, huh?"

"When the Don's prisoner runs out of the building like he's on fire, one has to wonder what's up."

Silence for a time. Yuri seemd to actually be thinking before he spoke.

"Flynn's got something he has to do. Stopping a war would look pretty good on his resume."

An irritated sigh from Luke. The knight opened the cell door, to which Yuri finally did look his way.

"Any idiot can see you're not the kind to be sitting around when something like this is going on. So what're you waiting for?"

He seemed to consider Luke's words for a few moments. He stood, turned heel, and exited the prison cell, to Luke's relief. It just wasn't right that, friend or not, Yuri felt he had to take someone's place in a jail. It would've been more like him, or rather his criminal record, to just bolt out of there after he had freed Flynn.

"Yeah, you're right. But there is one small problem, Luke: what will the Don think with his prisoner gone?"

Confused, Luke shrugged. He was going to say something along the lines of "Oh, we'll just have to explain to the Don what happened after the war is stopped," but he never got to finish his sentence. Because that jerk, that complete jackass Yuri had done the unthinkable—grabbed Luke by the collar and flung him into the cell previously occupied by Flynn, and then Yuri. Luke had only just registered that Yur had thrown him in the cell when the door clanged shut, locked, with his jailor turning tail and running.

Ten seconds Luke sat in a daze in the cell, feeble sunlight casting striped shadows where the bars were. Then he swore colorfully, punched a gauntlet gloved fist into the concrete floor. Did Yuri just hate him or something? He really didn't understand it. Verbal jabs he could understand, maybe even that embarrassing bit with his diary, but this--? Well, it wasn't all hopeless. If Yuri had broken the first lock with his sword, then it was just a matter of … Luke blinked.

There was a sword a foot and a half away from the cell door. A short sword, slightly curved, sheathed in a scabbard to match the scarlet uniform of the Royal Guard. Even in the feeble light he could see the initials embroidered in silver on the leather scabbard: L.F. Luke fon Fabre. Luke's sword was sitting out there, beyond his reach.

"How the hell …?" But he did know. Somehow that diabolical devil Yuri had not only replaced the lock on the cell door, but also separated Luke from his sword. In lieu of vehemently swearing and raging, he settled for heaving a sigh and leaning back against the wall. Fantastic. Yuri just left him for the Don to find, which he found just as appealing as being thrown in a pit of wolves.

"That _bastard!"_

--

Despite their worrying, the others couldn't just wait for Luke and Yuri to turn up again. Estelle had taken to healing the injured with her healing artes, those that had gotten ravaged by monsters on the way to the city, or into skirmishes between the knights and the guilds. Rita and Repede, an unlikely pair, were shadowing Barbos, the leader of the Blood Alliance, the guild thought to be responsible at least in part to the war about to happen.

As it happened, Yuri did turn up—without Luke. For all the prying questions, Yuri did not answer, at least entirely. He had said something along the lines of, "Luke's just enjoying a nice chat with the Don," although the Don had been absent from the Union Headquarters. Even if they wanted to make sure Luke was okay, as an Imperial Knight in the Den of Guilds, the priority had to be stopping Barbos, who was after all working with that snake Ragou.

After a heated exchange on the second floor of the tavern with both evildoers that resulted in actual fire from the maw of the dragon rider, there was in fact a way to stop their schemes. Ragou was easy enough; just keep him in place until the Knights could claim him. Barbos, however, was a bit difficult if the way he flew off was any indication.

"That dragon freak is my enemy!" Rita had screamed, adding to the sprawling flames eating up the room with her own magic. It wasn't smart, but the mage never had been at her intellectual best when she was raging.

Estelle had managed to calm her down to the point she wasn't endangering everyone anymore. Her eyes, emerald like Luke's, had looked so forlorn as Yuri mounted the dragon behind the rider clad in white armor. He grit his teeth, trying not to think of how she and the others would be caught in a war zone if Flynn hadn't arrived when he did. What did the Knights feed their horses?

"I'll need you guys to hold the fort here. We're going after Barbos."

As the dragon bore him and the rider to parts unknown, Yuri felt a sneeze coming on.

--

There were no corners large or shadowy enough to completely hide Luke, so he just settled for sitting down and accepting his fate. That did not stop the jolts of fear running up his spine when he heard the heavy footsteps of the Don, and saw his long shadow splayed across the concrete floor. The mighty leader of the Union came into view, and he stopped, confused. He looked Luke up and down, then let forth a laugh.

"Well. I jailed one knight but find another one. What's the deal, son?"

There was a strange noise emanating from Luke's throat, which he thought might've been a squeak. A squeak. He could just hear Yuri now: the captain of the Royal Guard, Alexei's personal unit … squeaking. He had been a spectacular and upstanding Imperial Knight, thank you very much! It was only after he had taken on this job, after Yuri had gotten involved, that things began to get strange.

"W-well, er, Whitehorse sir, it's just that … I didn't plan this. It just sort of … happened."

The Don's bushy brow quirked in question. "I didn't plan this either. Not that my plans are ruined if that rookie knight's out and about, I actually had a favor ta ask him."

Luke flashed back to the moment he had seen Yuri slip behind a door in the Headquarter's hallway, the only door that lacked a guildsman guarding it. "That's why you recalled that guard?" For there had been one prior to Flynn being jailed.

"Yeah. The scumbags that plan this sort of thing like to watch from someplace close. Sick bastards prolly having a nice front row seats to the front line."

Something did not quite click, and Luke had to ask. "So if you didn't want to go to war, why did you declare it outright back there?" Sure made someone wearing a knight's uniform look more like a gigantic target sign, with another sign in bold letters proclaiming, "Accepting all pointy objects and means to cause pain here."

The Don grunted. "Got some hotheads that wouldn't let me hear the end of it if I didn't raise hell. Not sure ya can do what I need done though."

The Knight clicked his tongue, displeased. "Lemme guess—you take care of home while I go do your dirty work. Like routing out those guys that caused this in the first place."

"Ya got the general heads and tails of it. Risky thing about bein' in da Union is that it means you're always bein' watched. Barbos really should've hid the fact he'd been working with Ragou better. Nothing escapes the master guilds, not even another master guild."

Luke considered. He had no other option, being locked in the Don's cell and all. He felt another pang of rage toward Yuri; not only had he thrown Luke in the cell, he had managed to get out of doing any dirty work too. He had to wonder if the devil had planned it that way. What would the Don say with his prisoner gone indeed.

It wasn't as if Luke wouldn't have the manpower to get it done. He had done things like this before, leading the Royal Guard to subdue and apprehend, even kill, notorious rings of criminals that escaped the general army. There was a slight problem, however. He didn't know exactly where his detachment of the Guard was now.

Despite Alexei's orders that Luke along with a part of the Royal Guard was to go accompany the princess, Yuri had taken Luke aside the moment they left Heliord's city limits. "For Estelle's own interests," he said. If Luke were to join their party, he had to be the only Royal Guard in it. In that moment when their eyes had met under Tolbyccia's stormy skies, Luke knew, like a blade slicing him through to the bone, that Yuri was a dangerous man.

Thusly Luke's men were stationed at an outpost in the forests between Dahngrest and Heliord. Ordinarily Luke would have been able to send them a letter by carrier bird, to summon them if needed, but with everything going on at the moment, they were probably on the front line of the soon to be war. Crossing over from guild lines to knight lines would most likely get him injured if not outright killed.

"So where's this Barbos now?" He asked, still thinking. "He's the leader of the Blood Alliance, right?"

"Yep. At the moment he's prolly still in the city, but my spies discovered he's got this huge spire in the desert near Dahngrest. One ridiculously huge blastia. If Barbos is fond of anything it's power. If that rookie knight's friend can't get him—and I know he had trouble with Barbos—that's where he'll most likely go."

Luke tilted his head to one side. What the Don was going to propose was the Royal Guard infiltrating this blastia spire, disabling it, and apprehend or do away with the Blood Alliance leader. Should there be any casualties, they would be those of the Imperial Knights, not any of the Union guilds. Slick, and it certainly suited the Don's style. Make his enemies, or at least his antagonists, clean up the mess. Still, as he was under the Don's roof, there wasn't a way he could refuse. Well, refuse and hope to live afterward.

Sighing, Luke stood. "Alexei might not approve, Whitehorse, but Barbos and his guild are a danger to Lady Estellise. As captain of the Royal Guard, I must do what I can to eliminate threats from the empire's royalty."

Smirking, the Don knelt down and scooped up the sword that lay on the concrete. "So you're saying you'll do it?" He knocked the cell door open, holding the sword toward its owner, hilt first. Luke grimaced at taking orders from a guild master—what would Alexei say indeed—but he didn't see any way out of it. He stepped forward, out of the cell, and took his sword.

--

Good lord. Good _Score!_ Damn it all if Yuri-freaking-Lowell had not planned it this way! Reaching the detachment of the Royal Guard had not been particularly difficult. They had indeed been placed with the rest of the knights making ready to war on Dahngrest, but by the time Luke had gotten out of the city, Flynn had found Ioder's real letters, and together with the Don put the war out before it had begun.

Which left Luke's job quite clear cut: mobilize the Guard, find this spire of Barbos's and continue from there. He didn't see the Lady he was supposed to protect on his way out, but he supposed he didn't have to be two feet away from her to keep her from harm. He likened it to a man going to war in order to protect his family. And in a way, what with his mother being a direct relative to one of the previous Emperors, Lady Estellise—Estelle_ was_ his family.

Luck was quite sourly ironic. Luke had no idea as he and the Guard approached the spire in the desert, the Tower of Gears, who he would meet on its very doorstep. Certainly not the azure haired Krityan beauty that made violently killing with a lance look like an art form, but most of all certainly not the dark haired manifestation of everything that made Luke's life go wrong at the moment.

Unlike the tone he had taken with his other companions, even Raven, Yuri had taken a light hearted voice as Luke approached. He and the Royal Guard had saved Yuri just then, as a band of Blood Alliance or those in league with it had been barreling straight toward him. Luke was back in his element, the Imperial Knight who led Alexei's personal unit.

"Hey, Luke! So this is what you're like in uniform. No wonder you're so out of place among us."

To which Luke's men quirked their brows and sent their captain strange glances. Not that he could see, what with the men's helmets and his back being turned to them. Which was just as well, as they couldn't see the scarlet splash on his face to match his hair. However, there were no giggles, murmurs, or snickers. You just didn't undermine the captain of the Royal Guard, even if someone else did.

More to keep his own dignity intact than anything else, Luke ordered his men to keep the perimeter of the tower, at the minimum to be out of earshot. Estelle at least was here, so if his men could keep the tower contained from without, Luke would protect her from within. He approached the steps, toward Yuri, and reflexively tightened his hand into a fist. After everything, especially with that last bit of taunting him in front of his men, Yuri owed Luke very much.

Luke never, all his life, had condoned casual or mindless use of violence where it could be avoided. But Yuri had a way of ruffling his feathers to the point it was unbearable. It was unforgivable. Luke was determined to have his revenge, if only in one instance. A fabricated smile upon his face, he raised a gauntlet gloved fist, and drove it with a vengeance at Yuri's face.

Which did not reach its mark. Luke's fake smile quickly crumbled, devolving into a deep, jagged frown that his venomously green eyes mirrored with rage. Yuri's eyes positively glowed, a slanted smirk stretching his lips. In his right hand he held Luke's fist, had prevented it from making contact with his face. With a small satisfaction Luke noted that Yuri's hand trembled from the effort.

"Yeah, thanks but I've already had my share of punches today."

As he spoke, the Krityan woman standing near the doorway had an odd smile on her face, her arms folded over her bosom. Luke blanched. Yuri behaved so badly that women were physically striking him? Well, now. Resigned, Luke tore his fist away from the older man's.

"Fine, Lowell. But you owe me _big,_ after the way you just threw me in that cell back there."

"A prison cell?" Rita asked, brow quirked, the first two fingers of her right hand touched to her temple. She always did that when she was thinking. A loud, rough laugh emanated from her left. Raven was almost doubled over, a ridiculous grin plastered on his face.

"Hey, old man. What's so funny?"

Gasping for breath, Raven finally stood upright. "A cell, Yuri dear? This wasn't a prison cell by any chance, was it? Holy mother of all that is good in the world, those rumors 'bout prison must be true!"

Never one to miss a beat, Yuri replied, "You must know all about them, old man."

Luke was so glad, so very, very glad that his men were out of earshot of this—this nonsense. At a glance passerby must think he was either feverish or sunburned, his face was so red. Since direct violence against Yuri was at the moment not possible, he settled for a loud colorful cursing spree. He couldn't even do that, substituting profanity with something more suitable.

"_Sixth Fonstone!"_

More suitable it might've been, but only a few people actually understood the exclamation, for Karol passed a puzzled look at Rita and asked, "What's a fonstone?"

--

A/N: Ahh I'm slipping into my pattern of drawing things out again. But playing Yuri and Luke against one another is so fun xD


	3. The Tower of Gears

A/N: In which things get a little more interesting, with more Abyss characters since readers asked for them. Still thinking of how to get Mieu in the picture though.

--

In next to no time at all, Luke discovered he hated the Tower of Gears. It was dark, noisy, and pratically infested with the Blood Alliance and other nasty creatures. The key to the tower seemed to be the Sorcerer's Ring Yuri had on him, and to progress through the tower they had to move its gigantic gears. Also, the walkways and staircases were poorly suited for large battles, wherein Luke felt more like a cornered rat than a knight.

In these situations where a number of enemies boxed them in on all sides, Estelle's talents with magic, healing and offensive, were indispensible. She had learned Healing Circle, an arte to heal all those that stood in its radius. Luke wasn't even sure what kinds of injuries he had suffered, as the princess was so quick to heal everyone's hurts.

Still, he wasn't inclined to complain; guarding the princess was much easier with her healing power. As they traversed the tower, their formation was thus: Yuri and Luke in the front, Estelle in the back, with Judith in the middle. The others were watching the rear. Raven and Karol's supportive artes would be useful in fighting against an ambush. Rita's magic was self-explanatory.

Repede was useful in a myriad number of ways in this infernal spire. Not only was he able to steal items from their enemies (why would a dog want to steal other people's money and items? Luke wondered this but never asked), bring gels to those who needed help in the event Estelle was unable to ("No way am I eating a gel that's been in a dog's mouth!" Rita had screeched), he was also very handy at scouting ahead for danger. The dangers in Barbos's tower were countless.

For what felt like most of Luke's life, his world revolved around moving gears, climbing stairs and watching that tube full of aer, the green energy dimly lighting their surroundings. As the volume of aer within the glass increased, getting taller, he craned his neck to keep looking up at it. Finally, the stream of viridian aer had reached the very top, and the third staircase they had encountered opened for them.

"Ugh," Karol groaned, making a great effort to carry just his bag, "this better be the top. I don't think I can take any more of these stairs."

"Heh, weakling." Rita chuckled, but she was also out of breath. The only ones who weren't nearly exhausted from climbing were Luke (rather obvious, he trained as a knight), Yuri (who had once been in the knights, but perhaps it was just his own tenacity), Judith (the Krityan woman from Luke's observations had a Yuriesque way of being immune to almost everything), and Raven (which was beyond Luke's capacity to understand).

"Take some medicine or food if you need it," Luke said. "If Barbos is at the top, we need to be prepared."

"Yah," Raven nodded in agreement. "No such thing as too careful when you're dealing with the leader of a master guild. A pretty vicious one, too."

"Just make sure to keep formation." Luke directed this more at Karol and Rita than anyone else. The boy, despite having been in a guild, had to be no more than tweleve, and Rita not much older, even if she was a genius mage. However, if he had to choose one, Luke would have chosen her to take with him into battle. If her fireballs were no good, she always had her book, and that whip. He got chills just thinking about it.

"Yeah, yeah, we got it." The selfsame Aspian mage replied, rolling her eyes, arms folded. "Of course we've got nothing at all to worry about with you two leading the troops."

Yuri snickered. "That's about the size of it."

Grudgingly, Luke had to agree somewhat. Despite their short time together, they did work well in battle. Even Judith was working her way into their fold, the swordsmen setting up enemies for her aerial attacks, which were getting more and more deadly and beautiful in every measure. Sometimes Luke had to be careful exactly what he thought about her. She was a Krityan—and way out of his league anyway.

"But are ya sure of the current formation, Luke?" Raven asked, a pathetic frown on his face. It could've been his imitation of a begging puppy, just not a very good one. "Is ol' Raven good for nuthin' but babysittin'?"

Without hesitation, Luke responded, "Yes." Raven gave a mock gasp, clutching at his chest in shock.

"Oh, c'mon Luke dearie, you're breakin' my heart!"

In quite possibly the first act that was not meant to pick on him or humiliate him, Yuri whispered to Luke, "Just ignore him. Just ignore him." The younger man almost cracked up laughing. He had been right, Yuri was an okay guy—to an extent.

-

The top of Ghasfarost Spire made Luke dizzy just to look from. It wasn't even a complete platform, just one of many others, connected by paths of gears. Cogs and gears everywhere; it was enough to amplify his occasional headache. But one thing that bothered him as they carefully emerged onto the platform …

"Where's Barbos?" Yuri asked, granite grey eyes flickering every which way. For some reason a vision exploded in Luke's mind—that of a window, on a rainy night, someone asking the whereabouts of a goat, and that very same goat's leg going splat on the glass pane in a bloody wash. Luke gagged, covering his eyes.

"Ugh, I don't want lamb chops for a long while now …"

"What's wrong, Luke?" Estelle asked behind them, confused.

"Uh, nothing." As if having visions of a goat's severed leg hitting a window were the most natural thing in the world.

Krityans must have better eyesight than normal people, for at the moment, Judith pointed to a platform near theirs. "Over there!" Everyone's eyes flickered along Judith's line of sight, waiting with bated breath. Indeed there was a figure on that floor in the distance, with the same look as Barbos—large and rotund with an arificial arm.

Luke glanced at the machinized paths connecting one platform to the next. There were four to a platform, and according to Yuri's account of being ambushed by Blood Alliance guildsmen the night before, Barbos might call in his minions to help him fight. He expected a fight because there was no way a leader of a master guild would go down quietly.

They waited, swords drawn, trying not to get the glare of the sun in their eyes, for the leader of the Blood Alliance to make his move. The man did move eventually, but not in the way anyone had expected. Instead of charging off to battle with hordes of guildsmen at his sides, shouting declarations of the unworldly power he held, he had simple wobbled—and fell.

"What the hell?!" Yuri exclaimed, eyes fixed on Barbos as his body fell into the dark oblivion of his own spire. "The sword! What about the sword with the Lower Quarter's blastia core?!" Luke had not taken his gaze off the place where Barbos had fallen. Upon it walked another person, who knelt, as if he or she were picking something off the ground.

"You mean this thing?" In the light of the sun, they could see clearly—it was a young man, dressed in a black uniform bordered in red, long hair dark like the blood on his sword. In his free hand he held up an azure sphere that shone with its own light. Before Yuri could reply, the stranger tossed it down to their platform, where the former knight caught it.

"Did he just … kill Barbos?" Estelle tilted her head to one side, bewildered.

"Looks like it," Yuri murmured. He couldn't understand how, though, when back in Dahngrest Barbos had kept their entire party at bay with just that sword alone. The stranger must have heard Estelle, for he next said,

"No, the sword was too powerful for that. I just wounded him and he fell off over his own feet." He paused, as if considering something. Then his eyes landed on Luke. With his sword, black as obisidian, engraved and inlaid with gold, the stranger pointed out the crimson clad Imperial Knight.

"You there. Come here."

Luke quirked his brow. He exchanged glances with Estelle, Judith, then Yuri. In a hushed voice he whispered, "Uhm, should I go?" He wasn't too keen on the prospect of close quarters with the one that single handedly dispatched the leader of a master guild, even if he himself denied it. Such a man was dangerous; while Luke had dealt with dangerous people before, he always had the rest of the Guard at his back. Right now he had a Krityan, the princess, and Yuri at his back. Not exactly reassuring, especially when the stranger was asking for Luke alone.

"Of course you shouldn't go!" Estelle hissed back, insistent. "Who knows who that man is, who knows what he wants!" Before she could continue on her spiel, Yuri interrupted.

"Who knows what he'll do if Luke doesn't go."

"Hurry up, dreck!" The stranger yelled from his higher platform. Luke could almost see the throbbing vein on the man's forehead.

"What can he do?" Luke asked, a slight frown on his face. "He's all the way over there."

"You'll notice the gears that bridge our floor and his." Yuri replied. A wide smirk spread his lips, making him look wolfish. Luke understood what he was getting at. There were round devices on stands at each of the gear-bridges. Considering Ghasfarost's functionality, it didn't take half a brain to figure out what the devices could be for.

Luke walked forward, toward the bridge that connecting their floor to the stranger's. With one fluid motion he drew his sword and shattered the golden orb standing by the bridge. The gears shuddered, recoiling away, leaving nothing but a vast darkness between platforms. The stranger on the other platform yelled angrily.

"You stupid dreck!" He raised one hand, and belatedly Luke saw what the stranger was doing. He turned around, calling to the others, even in the back formation,

"Take cover! Get down!"

An azure energy manifested above their platform, from which giant icicles rained, a horrible sound echoing over Ghasfarost as the ice crashed on the metal on which they stood. The ice seemed to fall forever, in places everyone stood not a moment before; they scurried like rats to avoid being impaled. The fragments stood where they fell, creating a frosty cage that effectively trapped them on the platform. Finally, the ice stopped falling.

Yuri's mocking voice rose somewhere to Luke's right. "He's _all_ the way over there. _What_ can he do?"

"Shut up," Luke growled, getting to his feet. The icicles that managed to stay more or less whole were taller than him. He could see distorted reflections of himself and his companions, but not much more than that. He experimentally tapped the ice with his sword. To his dismay, it was quite solid.

He hadn't counted on one thing, however. Rita's voice ripped through the air, proclaiming her anger as much as her vast magical power. _"Spiral Flare!" _Not a moment too soon Luke threw himself to the floor, what little of it hadn't been impaled by the ice. The icy prison shattered, Rita's magic manifesting in a giant fireball that careened across the top of Ghasfarost Spire. The only bits of the ice left were showers of tiny pieces that crunched underfoot.

Luke slowly got to his feet, ready to throw himself off the tower if someone was going to shoot off any more magic like that. No wonder he preferred just a blastia that allowed him strike artes. It wasn't that he couldn't use magic, he had been quite proficient at it when studying under the Knights, he simply preferred not to.

"Damn Rita," Yuri said, brushing ice flakes off his clothes, "Since when did you know a spell like that?"

"Oh, it just came to me," The mage replied with a small smile. Luke made a mental note not to cross her anytime in the future. Or the present. He fervently hoped that he did not cross her in the past.

"Well, now what?" Karol asked, tilting his head to one side. "We've got your core, Yuri, and Barbos is kinda … gone …"

"That guy attacked us!" Raven exclaimed, putting an arrow to his bowstring. "You're not gonna just let him get away with that, are ya?"

"Problem," Luke gestured to the broken orb ahead of him, "bridge is out. I don't think your Wind Blade would reach that far." He glanced at the guildsman's bow. "Or your arrows. His floor is higher up than ours."

"Then what about Rita's magic?" Karol looked at the mage with a sour expression. "Hers can reach up there no problem!"

"Yeah," She replied with a jagged frown, "but my line of sight is compromised. He could easily dodge what I threw for him."

Repede seemed to groan from his position at Yuri's side. No doubt the dog would've done something if he could have. Luke had always found the hound interesting; he'd never seen a canine who used a dagger to fight instead of fangs and claws. He supposed that's what the dog felt separated himself from others of his species, and monsters. Yuri scratched Repede's ear affectionately.

"Then that leaves one thing." His eyes flew to the Krityan beauty not five feet away. "Judy? You wanna vault up there and beat the crap outta that guy for us?"

The azure haired woman smiled, lifting up her lance. It was a little shorter than her by a few inches, but with the way she fought in the air, there was no doubt that she could get up there. And if what Yuri had implied earlier was true, she was no frail doll in close quarters. Involuntarily Luke shuddered.

"Well, I suppose so," she said quite sunnily. She lifted her spear, preparing to dash. Then the Krityan paused. Her pointed ears perked. "Hmm … does anyone else hear that?"

Luke opened his mouth to say no, but at the moment he did hear something. It sounded like someone was—

"Singing?" Yuri asked, brow knit in confusion. That was absurd, wasn't it? Who would be singing all the way up here, and why? Soon the melody and lyrics were audible to everyone standing atop the tower. It was impossibly foreign, no one could make heads or tails of what the words were. But there was one undeniable thing about the song. It was making everyone sleepy.

"What the hell …?" Rita tried valiantly to keep her eyes open, but from the way she was kneeling on one knee, she wans't for the waking world anytime soon. Karol had collapsed beside her, already snoring. Luke inwardly supposed he wasn't kidding when he said how tired he had been. Repede fell on the floor not two seconds after Karol. Estelle was leaning on her sword, nodding off, Raven was trying not to lean on his bow, for it was a transform bow with blades on it, which would have drastic ramifications if he fell on it.

Yuri was fighting the spell with every ounce of will he had, he was the only one besides Judith who was still standing tall. The Krityan seemed to be immune to the music. Luke would have fought it more, too, but he just couldn't. One of his headaches was threatening to bash his skull from the inside, and he was rather glad at the prospsect of sleep just to get away from the pain.

"Oh, guess I'd better be quick then," Luke heard Judith say nonchalantly. He heard the rapid clicking of her boots on the metal floor, the ting of a spear's point driven into the platform, and the whoosh of a body flying through the air. With a loud metallic clang Judith must have landed on the other platform. Luke didn't hear anything else, slumbering peacefully under the sun.

Yuri was an expert at utilizing his willpower. Everyone else had fallen asleep under the song's strange spell, even Raven. If he were to pass out too, there was no telling when they would wake up and if they would. As the old man at last fell to the floor, out like a light, Yuri focused his whole frame of mind to one thing—he lifted his sword, and cut his own arm. Instantly he snapped out of the fogginess of impending hibernation.

"Hot damn that hurts!" He hissed, tears forming in his eyes. It wasn't a deep or particularly dangerous cut, just enough to make sure he wouldn't fall asleep. Quickly he consumed an apple gel, fishing in his bag for a bandage. He wrapped the wound tightly, and though he still heard the song, it wasn't affecting him anymore. He craned his neck, trying to see how Judith was faring.

Out of the corner of his eye, there was a golden flicker of light.

-

Judith was a master acrobat. Ten years she had of experience fighting with a spear, time she spent making such an unwieldy weapon more effective and easier to use. Where most lancers fixed themselves on the ground, launching themselves forward or throwing their weapons, Judith had taken a different approach—fighting in the air. Indeed most warriors did not expect this, and it gave her an edge in combat.

She landed with a loud clang on the next platform, where the stranger that had attacked her and her friends stood. Or, she quirked a brow, head tilted to the side in confusion, had been standing. Like everyone else, this red-haired stranger was also succumbing to the song of sleep. He wasn't quite asleep yet, but he leaned on his sword, his long mane hiding his face.

Judith's face fell. While she didn't have a problem paying back those who owed her (Yuri's expression as she punched him one last time came to her with a slight giggle), what was the proper thing to do if the one that owed her was on the verge of falling asleep? Surely it would be a rude awakening, but it was no fun if he couldn't fight back. So she settled for the next best thing—beginning by hitting him upside the head with the butt of her spear.

Almost too easily his body fell back, sword clanging beside him. He dropped something else, too. A transparent red sphere rolled across the metal floor, bumping against her boot to a stop. Curious, Judith knelt, picking it up. She held it so it reflected the sunlight, examining it with a critical wine colored eye. It looked like a blastia core.

"But it's not a blastia core." She said softly, almost to herself. There were a few moments of silence. Then her lips pulled into a small smile. The singing had stopped. She heard the clinking of high heels on metal, and a young woman appeared before her.

Half her face was hidden underneath her long hair of burnished silver. Her one visible eye was a deep turquoise, like the sea. She was clad in an odd manner of dress like the stranger red-haired swordsman, but it didn't resemble his in any way. It was a brown dress, split for mobility, hemmed and embroidered in gold. She wore red leggings that disappeared into her boots, and gloves that ended at her elbow. She carried a short staff headed with a curved blade. Underneath the folds of the dress Judith saw a glint of metal.

"It's not a blastia core." The woman said, slowly approaching Judith. Her eye flickered to the unconscious man on the floor, then back at the Krityan. "And I'd appreciate it if you'd give it to me."

Judith tilted her head curiously. "Hmm, does this belong to you?"

"Not to me personally. But this man," she nudged him with her toe, "stole it, and it must be returned."

Judith considered for what might have been five seconds. She slipped the orb in her bag, regarding the other woman with a smile. "Now that you've got me curious, I think I might keep it." The woman, who had undoubtedly been singing, narrowed her eye, her grip on her staff tightening.

This woman did not look like a pushover, even if Judith's weapon was bigger. The Krityan had never heard of a kind of magic arte that could put people to sleep, much less was sung, so she knew that the female was dangerous. Unlike fighting a man half asleep, fighting another female warrior like herself sounded like fun to Judith.

Unfortunately, the fight did not last as long as Judith would've liked. It was glorious, too—the woman blocked all her strikes proficiently with her short staff alone, was an expert at speed casting, and indeed Judith did not imagine that glint of metal under her opponent's dress, as she had thrown knives at some point. These Judith dodged by jumping and flipping in the air, but the adrenaline rush she had gotten as the knives flew past her was unbelievable. The fight abruptly ended when the man had pushed himself to his feet, cursed vehemently, and ran.

The woman parried Judith's strike. She looked over her shoulder at the red-haired swordsman's retreating back, clearly alarmed. Without another glance spared for Judith she threw off the Krityan, shouted, "Asch, wait!" before pursuing him. By the time Judith had gotten back to her feet, the woman and the man were both gone.

"Ohh," she frowned, disappointed. She hadn't had such a fun fight in a while. Fighting with Yuri in the cell was fun, but it had been staged. That had been a real battle, with real danger. The fact it had been against another woman ranked it high on Judith's list of favorite fights. Well, it wasn't all a lost cause. The singing had been stopped, Barbos was out of the way forever, Ghasfarost Spire was no longer operating, and she had obtained this curious object.

She looked over her shoulder, at the other platform below. It didn't look like Yuri had fallen asleep at all, but the ones who had were coming to their senses. Estelle complained of an ache because she had slept atop her shield, Karol said he didn't want to stop resting just yet, Rita hit Karol upside the head for his remark, Repede yawned as he stretched, and Raven had in fact collapsed on his transform bow. The older man howled for help, cuts on his arms and even a few on his face.

Estelle immediately came to Raven's aid, healing artes pouring out of her like a fountain of golden light. Judith's eyes, however, were on Luke. He wasn't awakening as quickly as the others were. Or if he was, it didn't look like it. There was a hand on his head, as if he were in pain, understandable. What Judith did not understand was the way the Imperial Knight glowed, emitted a golden light. It was a deep reddish gold, too, not like the yellow of Estelle's artes.

Yuri tentatively approached Luke, asking after his well being. Luke didn't respond, but after a few moments the glowing had subsided, and he shook himself awake. Other than that, everyone was fine. Judith observed her newfound companions, arms folded as she thought. It looked like Luke might have some mysterious powers of his own, but they were nothing like Estelle's.

_I may have to fight him, though._ She thought grimly. Luke's job was to protect Estelle, and if the situation ever came to be that Judith might have to kill the princess after all, he and undoubtedly Yuri would rise to her defense.

She just hoped that day would never come.


	4. Royal Will

A/N: This part has been hard to write grr.

--

Glorious. That was the only way Luke could desribe what it was like to return to Dahngrest. Flynn's brigade had apprehended Ragou, as the magistrate had been caught red-handed in working with a guild plotting against the Empire. Barbos was dead, his blastia dismantled, and Estelle had finally agreed to return to the capital. Luke was glad of an opportunity to put his feet up, though he was a little saddened that it meant their group was parting ways in the guild city.

Judith had taken leave of them before they left the Tower of Gears. He wished she had stayed, but Krityans were enigmatic like that. Not like other people. Raven had to get back to Altosk, Rita—typical mage—wanted to go around the world to research aer krene, and Yuri and Karol were going to see about making a guild of their own. So easily they went back to their lives, it was almost as if their time together had never been.

But Luke cheered up whenever he thought he'd never have to put up with Yuri and his unpredictable antics ever again. No more being picked on, no more mocking in front of his knights, no more getting thrown in jail. Luke still didn't quite understand just why Yuri had done that, especially since Luke had helped him. Yet the older man had been acting differently toward Luke in Ghasfarost. Maybe had they spent a little more time together, they could've been friends of a sort.

More time together was the last thing Luke had expected.

-

Rage. That was the only way Yuri could feel that night when Karol had burst into the inn, hollering the injustice that Ragou, due to his high rank in the Council, was getting off with a mere demotion. After everything the bastard had done, controlled the weather with a blastia to keep his people isolated, fed them to beasts he kept in his own palace. Nothing Ragou could ever do would redeem him of his deeds, even if he had the heart to try. Even if he had a heart at all.

The act of apprehending Ragou, although he wasn't under arrest for long, had landed Flynn a promotion as captain of his own brigade of knights. Yuri had talked with Flynn then. The Knight was frustrated that he couldn't do anything about Ragou, that he was immune to the justice system. Yuri had a simple answer for his friend: keep working his way up, so he could get into a position that changed the flawed system. He had also left a question—what would Flynn do about the criminals the law couldn't touch?

Flynn had answered: "I don't know."

But Yuri knew what had to be done. There was no honor, there was no glory, or even joy. Just a grim satisfaction as he found the magistrate on Dahngrest's bridge. He had no idea why the man was even out and about and not cozy in his cushy bed, but so much the better. Yuri's senses had dulled then.

He was dimly aware of his sword ripping open Ragou's robes, of the blade pirecing soft flesh beneath. Of blood splattering on the cobblestones underfoot. Of Ragou's last words: "I was so close! Dein Nomos …!" Of Ragou's body falling over the side of the bridge. Of a loud splash in the river beneath.

There was an odd tingling in his body then as he made his way back to the inn. It was like his body coming back online after it had been asleep. It made a strange humming noise in his head, but he brushed it off. The magistrate was dead, that was all that mattered. He saw Repede curled up outside, the dog's good eye fixed on him. He loved Repede, but there was no way the dog could've understood what was going on, what Yuri had done. Yet the way he looked at him made Yuri think otherwise.

--

So quickly things in Dahngrest had devolved into hell, and Luke had no idea what to make of it. A giant avian monster flew around the guild city, attacking with magic. Commandant Alexei (when did the Commandant arrive, Luke thought) ordered the use of a titantic machine called Heracles to fight it. Things were blurry then. As per his job, Luke went to Estelle should any danger befall her. The monster hovered before her, and _spoke._

Perhaps those piloting the Heracles were unaware of the princess's presence behind the beast, but they opened fire. The monster took to the air, dodging it, leaving the projectile of aer to hit the bridge head on. The structure quickly crumbled in a thick cloud of smoke and ash. Yuri and Flynn stood on opposite sides of the cleaved bridge. Flynn had called to the princess, that she would be in no danger as soon as the knights were able to come to her aid. But Estelle shook her head.

"I'm sorry Flynn, but I'm going to continue my journey!"

"But—"

"Hey, Flynn, catch!" Yuri tossed an azure sphere across the gap, which Flynn caught with a surprised expression. "Give that to the people in the Lower Quarter for me!"

"Hey!"

Flynn, Yuri, and Estelle's eyes were drawn below, where the cry had come from. Now that they looked, there was a pair of gauntlet clad hands clinging to the edge of the ruined bridge. Yuri leaned forward, curious. Indeed, the one to whom the hands belonged was none other than Luke fon Fabre, holding on for dear life as he dangled over the debris clogged river below.

"Will you stop gawking and help me the hell up!?" Luke screeched, glaring venomously at Yuri.

"A wee bit slower and you would've been incinerated," Yuri smirked, but he knelt and helped the Royal Guard Captain to his feet.

-

Luke didn't quite know how he had been dragged as far off as exactly halfway to Heliord from Dahngrest, or how Judith had happened to be spirited with them as well. All he remembered after Yuri helped him on the bridge was dashing after Estelle, calling out to her. They'd finally stopped for a rest, huddling in tents, the thin canvas just barely managing to keep out the rain.

They'd camped a ways from the road, deep in the brush. Repede stood vigil, patrolling the perimeter, occasionally sniffing the air or ground. The princess had left Dahngrest with no intention of returning to the capital, not yet. Despite the craziness that happened, Luke found that he didn't mind it. The important thing was that she was safe.

Safe, and sanctioning the formation of Yuri and Karol's guild. Judith had joined, seemingly on a whim (a Krityan that wasn't whimsical was no Krityan at all). Raven couldn't join, as he was already with Altosk, neither could Estelle. Jokingly Yuri had invited Luke into the guild, which he staunchly refused. Karol had tried to give their guild a name—what was it again? Super Ultra Courageous Braves? Somehow Luke didn't see how anyone would take a guild seriously with a name like that.

Even if she wasn't able to join the guild, Estelle had rectified this with a name of her own: Brave Vesperia. It had a nice ring to it, so every guildsman had accepted it as the name of their budding organization. The guild had taken on its first job: escorting Estelle to see the strange entity called Phaeroh, and with that set up camp for the night.

"You write in that thing every day?" Yuri's voice carried from the small tent next to Luke's. The redhead sighed, putting his pen down. He never could concentrate when it was noisy.

"Yeah. Something the matter with it?" He could almost hear Yuri shrug.

"Nah. I tried keeping a journal once, never could keep it up for more than a few days."

Yuri did not seem like the thinking type, but Luke didn't say so. He reread the final passage of his diary's latest entry, the name of the new guild. Estelle wasn't just a thinker, she was a dreamer. She had given them a name with quite the story behind it. He wondered if Yuri knew. Probably not.

"Do you know where your guild's new name comes from?"

"It's the brightest star in the sky."

"There's a story behind it." Luke replied. "Estelle will probably tell you all about it later, but that's not a real star. It's a fonstone."

"A what stone now?" There was rustling, and Yuri had emerged from his tent, at least partway. He quirked a brow quizzically.

"Fonstone." Luke repeated, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "Two thousand years ago, Yulia recorded her prophecy, her Score, on seven stones, each the size of a mountain. Somehow the fonstones ended up in the sky, though Scorers will read what's written on the stones that fall back to earth. Brave Vesperia is the brightest fonstone, though nobody knows for sure which it is."

"A prophecy?" Yuri scratched the back of his head, looking uncertain. "So is that like fortunetelling or something?"

"No. The Order of Lorelei used to be the empire's religion until seventeen years ago. It's where fortunetelling probably came from. Yulia's Score is the only one known to be so accurate."

"How accurate is it, exactly? Did it predict the Order breaking off from the Empire?"

"It predicted the war that caused the split."

Yuri had a strangely thoughtful look on his face. "But they knew what was written in the Score, right?"

"Of course. Following the Score is one of the Order's highest virtues."

"Then … is it really a prophecy? Would the war have happened if they didn't obey it?"

Luke paused for a moment, brow knit. "Never thought of it that way before."

"A prophecy that comes true only if you obey it is no prophecy at all." As if he had answered one of the greatest mysteries of life, Yuri returned to his tent and fell back on his blankets.

For a while Luke sat where he was, listening to the rain fall all around them. "Only if you obey it … so is the Score wrong, Master Van?"

-

Luke's faith in the general army of the Imperial Knights diminished greatly when they had come to Heliord. Or, more specifically, the Cumore Brigade. Estelle had noticed that the people of the city were lured into labor camps under false pretenses of joining the nobility, a rank that only the Emperor could bestow. With the throne vacant, there was no way any of these people would get anything out of the atrocious conditions they were forced under.

Thus Brave Vesperia had accepted its second job: finding the man Teagle in the labor camp below the city. There was a guard posted at the lift on the balcony, but Karol was opposed to direct action. All they had to do, he said, was lure the guard away. Luke had a feeling Yuri would tell Judith to go seduce the guard. His jaw dropped when unanimous vote named Karol the seductress instead.

"Hey," Yuri said with a laugh as the women dragged off the poor, unfortunate boy, "It was his idea."

"You're despicable." Luke groaned, covering his eyes when Estelle and Judith returned with a pink monstrosity in tow. As Karol went to busy himself with the guard, the redhead gave Yuri an exasperated glance. "And you do know that I could've made the guard leave on Alexei's authority?"

"Yah, you prolly could." Yuri replied, smirking as he watched the crossdressed guild master. "But this is more fun."

Against Karol's desires, the encounter had ended in violence as Yuri knocked the guard unconscious with a well placed smack upside the head. The next phase of the operation was for someone to disguise themselves as an Imperial Knight and head down the lift. Or just use an actual Imperial Knight if one was handy.

Thusly Luke found himself marching to the cavalier's headquarters, for information if nothing else, such as why innocent people were being forced into manual labor. He didn't find much there. Just a royally pissed off mage and a Splash to the face. The pressured water stream sent him careening into a nearby book shelf, burying him under a mountain of tomes.

"Watch it, crazyhead! It's me, Luke!" Heavy volumes shifted as Luke resurfaced; he had to duck again as a fireball hit the wall above him. Finally Rita recognized him and stopped her barrage of magic.

"Luke? What're you doing over here? Weren't you taking Estelle back to the capital?"

"The best laid plans of mice and men … anyway, what're you doing here? Are you trying to bring the whole place down?"

What transpired in Heliord became something more of a blur for Luke then, starting with dull echoes of Rita's exclamations of the empire secretly selling hoplon—weaponry—blastia to the shady Leviathan's Claw guild for purposes none too pleasant. Easily, perhaps too easily, they discovered Cumore, deluded with visions of becoming Commandant after Alexei, had arranged this deal with the Claw; Heilord was to be his official base of operations.

Brave Vesperia had completed its first job shortly thereafter in resucing the man Teagle from Heliord's laboring grounds. Estelle, horrified at what Cumore and Leviathan's Claw had planned, wanted to go after the strange man Yeager in addition to the corrupt Captain, but was dissuaded as Judith maintained their primary concern was meeting with Phaeroh. Yuri had gotten the guild, Rita, Luke, and Estelle moving again just before the arrival of Flynn's Knights, slipping through the new Captain's fingers.

Just before they were out of the forest by Torim Harbor's outskirts, who was to show up besides the old man Raven. They had set up a temporary camp, as spending the night right after escaping from Flynn didn't seem like such a hot idea. Yuri had been scattering the last of the campfire's ashes when the Don's underling had stepped into their midst, clearing his throat loudly.

"Yeesh, you young'uns are something else. First you run off with the princess, then you leave a fine mess for me to step into back in Heliord. I'm starting to think you kids like to make my life difficult on purpose."

Instantly a chord struck within Luke—for once someone else shared his view on the peculiar situtations he found himself in all too often lately. Were it anyone else he would have passed it off as a strange coincedence, but they had one common factor: Yuri Lowell.

"If anyone wants to make our lives difficult, it's him, not all of us," Luke said with a sigh, jabbing a thumb at Yuri. The elder man quirked a brow in response, brushing ashes off his clothes (like one could tell if there was soot on him, his clothes were far too dark).

Rita smirked. "With a royal touch to boot." Estelle's face turned pink in the obvious reference.

After a long silence and hefty sigh, Yuri replied, "If you think that's difficult, then you got a long way ahead of you."He glanced at Luke with wolfish grin. "You still have that diary? I have a feeling the next few weeks are going to get interesting."

With a frown that was almost a pout, Luke maintained that he would have kept up with the writing anyway.

--

_Yuri might not be book smart, but he always seems to have it right on matters of instinct. His feeling had been right; the next month and a half were certainly interesting, with danger of life and limb scrawled all over. In Torim Harbor we spent the night, making plans for getting to Desier and asking Raven why he had followed us. Turns out the Don sent him for two things: keeping tabs on Estelle, and to deliver a letter from the Don himself to the Duce of Nordopolica. That city's on the tip of the Desier continent, so delivering it will be easy once we get there._

_Only getting there is the problem. We'd need a ship to take us there, and with half the Empire, Flynn included, out on our trail, we could easily be contained and hampered here. I don't know what I'm thinking; I should grab Estelle as soon as everyone else is asleep, rejoin the Knights and take her to the capital. But I overheard her talking to Rita in their room that night, what the monster Phaeroh had said to her. He'd called her an "insipid poison," and that it must be eliminated._

_I have no idea what that means; no one does. But … to send Estelle packing home now, after something like that … it wouldn't be right. I know that if someone cast the concept of who I was into such doubt, I wouldn't rest until I knew what it meant, not only for me, but everyone it might involve. To condemn her to stay in a castle, never knowing … I can't stomach it. _

_In the morning, we had incredible timing. We bagged ourselves a ship practically for free—Kaufman of Fortune's Market needed an escort en route to Nordopolica for a trade deal. The sea monsters in her route are supposed to be vicious this time of year. Karol wasn't very eager, but Brave Vesperia took on this job as well, with the ship, Fiertia, being the reward. Well, our own ship wouldn't be bad, we wouldn't have to worry about the Knights holing us up at port anyhow._

_We downed the mermen no problem, though some of us took some nasty hits from the anchors they were carrying. Boy am I glad I got my tetnus shots when I was a kid. For those that were injured, we had Estelle (naturally), with Raven and Karol to support her efforts. I never will respond to Raven in any way for healing me if he keeps asking "Who loves you, baby?" every time he uses his arte. As if that old bat could love; he'd sooner drive that knife of his into any one of us when we weren't looking._

_Then, about halfway to Nordopolica … _

"Front, I mean, bow!" Rita shouted as the collossal shadow that all but dominated their field of vision loomed over them. There was a great rumble as everyone lost their footing, collapsing on deck. Hoisting themselves up, a gigantic ship of incredible age drifted before them, acting as a solid wall to the Fiertia.

"The ceres blastia's not working!" Tokunaga, the navigator, trilled, tweaking its mechanisms to get it working, to no avail. Shrieking in disbelief, Rita ran over to look at the blastia as well, but even the efforts of a genius mage were in vain.

Nonchalant as always, Judith said with a pensieve look, "Hmmm, maybe it's cursed?"

"No, no way! That's not possible!" Rita shouted, her green eyes wide.

Ignoring her, the Krityan glanced at the prow of the old ship. "I think it reads … the Atherum."

There were a few moments of collective shocks and expressed fears. Among the shrieking of Rita and Estelle, Yuri managed to convey that whatever was causing the Fiertia's blastia to malfunction, it probably had something to do with the ancient ship in their midst. At once Rita adamantly refused to set foot on a haunted ship (even through her maintaining that such things didn't exist).

"Well, okay," Yuri said thoughtfully, "I'll go, and take Repede with me. Who else wants to go?"

"You can't all go!" Kaufman shot at him, almost like venom. "What if something attacked us while you were gone?"

"Then the good Captain will help guard you." Yuri waved his hand, tiredly, but not in outright exasperation. Karol for one looked grateful at the prospect of staying onboard the Fiertia. In the end, since everyone else was scared witless, only Judith was willing to brave the Atherum with Yuri. When the Krityan inquired as to why Luke didn't want to go, the knight's answer was simple.

"It's my job to guard Estelle, and she's staying."

Then the imperial princess looked at Luke with innocent but damning forest green eyes.

"Luke, I'm perfectly safe on the Fiertia. But what if something dangerous is lurking on that ancient ship? If you're protecting me, you'd best go onboard and eliminate any threat to us."

It just wasn't fair. Yuri was doing nothing to hide that ridiculous grin sprawled on his face, and Judith looked far too pleased at the prospect. Luke groaned, rubbing his temple with a gauntlet gloved hand. The last thing he wanted to do was go onboard a cursed ship with Yuri, the cause of all his misfortune in the last two months.

"If that is your command, Highness," Luke murmured, grabbing his sword and shield.

-

There was no doubt in anyone's mind that the Atherum was indeed haunted. Monsters lurked in the ship, and part of it caved in on the first group, the mast toppling over like a child's toy block. Against Rita's will, the ones left on the Fiertia mounted a search party for the others, for if no one helped them, who would? Kaufman's protests were overrun with Raven's eloquent, "Most of us aren't in Brave Vesperia, and we don't gotta do jack for you!" Karol reluctantly added that he couldn't stand by while most of his guild was possibly injured or worse.

Everyone did reunite under the Atherum. As it turned out, it was indeed under a curse of a sort.

In the captain's cabin, they found a skeleton, still clothed in the dulled scarlet uniform of a sailor, slumped over his desk, clutching a box of the same faded red. There was an open travellogue on a small round table next to the desk, the parchment yellowed, the ink only a shadow of its former dusky glory. Estelle, who drunk in the words of books all her life, was drawn to it immediately. But her small mouth turned into a frown as she looked upon the pages.

"I don't know this writing. It doesn't look anything like the letters we use today."

"Well, it is an old ship," Raven replied, shrugging as if it that were the end of the matter. But then Luke stepped forward.

"I know it. It's an old form, but it's Ancient Ispanian." He was met with odd looks from all except Rita, Judith, and Raven.

"The language of the Geraios Civilization from over a thousand years ago?" Rita inquired, brow quirked as she folded her arms. Under her auburn bangs, her jade green eyes were suspicious, almost malicious.

"Geraios … that's what Krityans called the Dawn Age." Luke responded, never missing a beat. "It's the language of the theocracy of Daath, it was considered the 'educated' language back then." His eyes skimmed the pages of the old diary, reading them aloud in their tongue. It seemed this ship was lost at sea, with food and water gone, the crew dying slowly of starvation and dehydration. But the captain wrote adamantly that he must see the Clear Ciel Crystal back to his hometown of Yormgen, for it had the power to drive back the vicious monsters of the world.

"That sounds like a barrier blastia." Yuri said,echoing the common sentiment as Luke finished reading.

"But that doesn't make sense," Rita protested, forgetting the "haunted" aspect of the Atherum completely in her indignation. "If this is the language of the Geraios Civilization, then they should have already had blastia to protect them from monsters!"

In reply, Luke read further from the diary. "The month of Bluerre, era of Azul."

"Both of which were even older than the Geraios," Estelle supplied eagerly. "At least, before the Geraios invented blastia."

"But what's this Clear Ciel Crystal he's talkin' about?" Raven asked. All eyes lingered on the small red box the skeleton of what was thought to be the captain clutched so preciously in bony fingers. "It don't sound like a blastia core, even if they had something like back then." Though everyone clearly wanted to know what this strange object was, none were willing to disturb the dead to get it. Except a Krityan woman who was immune to superstition.

"Here you go." She smiled sunnily, holding the box out. One of the captain's skeletal arms dangled off the lid, clouds of dust appearing in the air. Raven made a squeak, backing up half a step from the "princess" he coveted so dearly.

"Judy darlin', ya got nerves of steel or somethin'."

The ship shuddered, and all movement ceased. Karol's jaw dropped, pointing at the large mirror on the opposite side of the room. Though there were no visible creatures in the cabin, many of them swarmed in the world of the mirror. Luke, Yuri and Judith prepared their weapons; they had encountered creatures of this sort in other parts of the ship. Invisible things that were seen only in reflected light.

"We'll talk about that later." Luke said, reaching for sword and shield, paragons of the Imperial Knights.

-

Oddly, the ceres blastia had begun working again right after they had procured this "clear ciel crystal," from the Atherum. Rita and Kaufman were of one mind, to get the hell away from the haunted and cursed ship, so thick with ill will it had disrupted a fully functional blastia. No one really thought much of the tiny red box they had acquired; Estelle wanted to return it to the one the captain had been waiting for, in a town called Yormgen. Rita had dismissed the notion as ridiculous, as the town might not even exist anymore.

But she was more sympathetic after Judith had reproached Estelle—though a small and freshly formed guild, Brave Vesperia was not meant to head to the corners of the earth on the girl's random whims. In a way completely out of line with how she had acted previously, Rita took the box, and declared she would take it to Yormgen herself. She was unbound in relation to the guild and its contract with Estelle. She could do as she pleased.

Shortly thereafter, the Fiertia had docked at Nordopolica. Fireworks blazed in the night skies overhead, and Raven expressed excitement at having arrived at the "party" city, where Karol and Yuri had countered they were there strictly on business. They would deliver the Don's letter and continue through to the Sands of Kogorh to take Estelle to meet Phaeroh. That deflated the archer's mood, but only a little. He never was too down, as if he were afraid of showing his true self when everyone was looking. Even if no one was looking.

Fond farewells between Kaufman and the ones that guarded her and her cargo were exchanged. Despite the mermen and the trouble with the Atherum, they had actually arrived ahead of her schedule. She left the Fiertia and its navigator, Tokunaga, to the guild Brave Vesperia as payment in lieu of Gald. And really, their own ship, even if it wasn't brand new, was quite worth much more than a handful of coins.

"Wow," Luke said upon stepping onto the dock of the harbor. His emerald eyes fell over the city, drinking in the sights, quite active even so late at night. The moon shone in her bed of velvet and sparkling diamond stars, the silver light bathing the city in a beautiful glow. The whole city was built of well crafted stone, and though half the structures had fallen tumbling into the ocean beside it, that did not at all diminish Luke's admiration for it.

But Yuri always jumped at the bit to ruin it. He strolled forward, at a bulletin board posted for those traversing on and off ships. Tacked on were sheafs of paper, guilds asking for recruits, various bits of news and warnings, and lastly, on one side of the board by itself, was a paper of imperial issue. Even from the Fiertia's gangplank Luke saw the badly done caricature of Yuri's protrait. Couldn't the Imperial Knights get better artists? Or it could easily have been intentional, a resounding shout of revenge from Schawnn's knights to their tormentor.

Yuri swiped the wanted poster from the bulletin board, walking back over to the dock, clearing his throat. Luke rolled his eyes. Lowell had taken on the habit of keeping up to date on his status as a wanted man, like they were badges of honor. Well, if one had to go the wrong way, might as well make a few waves while he was at it. Luke blinked.

"Wait, wait, wait, why is there a poster wanting your arrest?" Luke asked, confused. "Didn't Estelle pardon your crimes--?"

"Ah, ah, ah," Yuri waved an index finger in Luke's direction. "That was before. They didn't pardon any future acts." So coolly and cleverly he had managed to avoid saying the word "crimes." Like substituting the word had made his previous actions less serious than they were. Clearing his throat, Yuri read aloud from the wanted poster.

"Okay, lessee … 'Wanted for the second kidnapping of Her Royal Highness Lady Estellise Sidos Heraussein, blah blah blah, armed and dangerous …'" He stopped, granite grey eyes looking surprised, a strange light in them. Then he laughed uproariously. "Haha, check this out: 'Wanted also for the kidnapping and extortion of Imperial Knight Royal Guard Captain Luke fon Fabre!' Wow, I even managed to tick Alexei off. It says the Commandant himself will grant a favor within his means to the one who captures me and returns Luke and Estelle safely." He smirked as he saw the monetary reward for his capture. "Awh, yeah, almost twenty thousand Gald for my pretty little head."

Luke had heard nothing but white noise after "… for the kidnapping and extortion of Imperial Knight Royal Guard Captain Luke fon Fabre." Just that last sentence, over and over and over, echoing, bringing with it a pain wringing his mind. He lunged for the wanted poster, exclaiming, "That can't be right! We weren't kidnapped, Score damn it! We came of our own free—"

"Well, in the princess's case, yes." Yuri replied, his dark eyes gleaming with an almost maniacal spark, or was that simply the moon, brighter and richer in its fullness? "But I saved your life. I effectively own it, so you could say I'm extorting you to act on our behalf."

"Ugh, really?" Luke pinched the bridge of his nose, irritated. "What would you do if I were to walk out right now? You have no hold over me; you wouldn't hurt Estelle because you're guarding her on a job! There is nothing for you to gain by keeping me here! You couldn't hold me for ransom, even though I'm the Royal Guard Captain, I don't have much influence in the Knights or the Empire. No one would miss me in the Knights if I'm not there."

Yuri opened his mouth to reply, but Karol's voice sounded over everyone instead.

"Isn't that weird, then? Why would Alexei send a warrant for you along with Estelle if you're that much of a …" the lad paused, looking rather apologetic at using such a description for someone that had only shown him kindness, "third wheel?"

"I know, right?" Rita added, arms folded, foot tapping the paved dock impatiently. "It's as if Alexei would rather have you at his side than on the field. That's absurd isn't it? How can Luke do his job if he isn't out here?"

"Well," Estelle interjected, her ands clasped together politely, "it makes sense to me. If I'm back in the capital, it wouldn't make sense for Luke to be in the field; the Royal Guard has always accompanied royalty to ensure its safety."

"Yeah," Yuri said. Like with much else, the dark-haired man took it all in one simple stride. One explanation was enough, even if it was only pure speculation. He grinned wolfishly at Luke, still holding the wanted poster. "But even so, you won't leave, Luke."

"How would you know that? I can leave at any time."

"You won't because if you did, you'd be leaving Estelle to cross the desert with a bunch of guild people. You wouldn't be able to protect her yourself, which is your job, no matter what the circumstance."

Luke made an odd noise that sounded as if it were between a hiss and a grunt. He glared at Yuri, someone admonishing him about his job and dedication due to the Knights, the same Knights the older man had left, abandoning everything he was now disapproving of Luke even thinking of not upholding.

"Oh? So it's okay for Flynn to shirk his duty by pushing her on you?" The young captain had a capacity for the most amazing angry face anyone had ever seen, with a sharp tongue to match.

"It's different for Flynn. He may be a captain, but you—" here Yuri jabbed an accusing finger at Luke, which the younger man recoiled at, even if there had been no contact between them, "are captain of the Royal Guard. Despite what Alexei might send out, it is _your_ honor and duty in question, and if you really aren't necessary to the Knights, then isn't protecting her with all your strength all you truly have?"

"Fine!" Luke spat at last, after an uncomfortable length of awkward silence, young Fabre obviously fuming under the surface. "I won't leave now, but after this job she and I will!" At the sting of his voice, Estelle, Karol, and even Rita and Raven looked stricken, unpleasantly surprised. Immediately, seeing their faces all drawn to him, the fire died down, his hard eyes softening. But he still stormed off in the direction of the inn, murming something about going to sleep.

Yuri stared at Luke's retreating back, as if admiring the work of the Knight's cape, swirling embroidered patterns of red-gold standing out even from a distance. His eyes had a strange look about them, seeming dark even for the late night and dim light.

"Jeez!" Rita exclaimed, fanning herself with a hand, as if suffocated by a stifling heat wave. "What the hell was that about!? I mean I know you two never really got along that well, but still!"

"Indeed," Judith added, who had until now retained silence. All eyes were now on Yuri alone, who showed no visible sign of being uncomfortable at their scrutiny. He ultimately shrugged, rather nonchalantly, as if driving Luke in a hateful rage hadn't bothered him in one bit. And perhaps it didn't.

"If you ask me," He said as they all began to move toward the city-collessuem, where there were residential districts as well as business areas, "he's just too young to be giving up what he has so easily."

Estelle's gaze dropped to the concrete pavement as they walked, not advisable, yet who would blame her? She felt responsible for this, for all intents and purposes forcing Luke to stay although he obviously chafed at being penned in, out of his element, isolated from the world he knew. "It's my fault." She didn't mean it as a question. "If I just stopped being selfish and went back to the capital, he wouldn't be going through this right now."

Raven stroked his chin, where not quite a beard but a prickly stubble grew, thinking. Walking beside him, although not quite in sync with his step, was Rita, who said—as it was her wont to rush to Estelle's defense as readily as any Knight of the Royal Guard—"If you went back now, you'd never meet with Phaeroh, you know? You wouldn't know why he wants you gone." Gone was a more polite way of putting it, yet no one seemed to object.

"Would knowing why he wants me gone change anything?" Estelle's walking slowed to a stop, in the middle of a knot of people that didn't quite make a large crowd, but a crowd nonetheless. "If I am a 'poison' to the world, then I always have been and always will. Who can change who they are?"

"Anyone can." Yuri said quite baldly. Estelle looked up at him, surprised. But not displeased. "And you can't walk out on us now, anyway, Estelle." He smiled. "We have a contract, remember?"

She nodded, and resumed walking.

-

In his own room in the outer ring of the arena that held most of the buildings, Luke silently fumed. It was a small room, but looked so much larger with just one occupant. Before, he had always roomed with someone else when they weren't stuck camping in the wilderness, like in Heliord, Dahngrest. He had shared a room with one of the other men, as was proper, mostly Karol, sometimes Raven and sometimes Yuri. Rooming with Yuri was easier than spending time with him on the road; the lone wolf was always silent, falling asleep without much of a fuss, Repede curled up at his feet.

It was the first time in a long while he had ever had a room to himself, before he had slept in the Royal Guards' barrack in the castle of Zaphias, albeit a bit removed from the others. They had to distinguish the captain from the rest of the guards somewhere. But he'd always shared a room with at least one other person. Now that he was alone, he felt like a spec of dust adrift in an endless sea.

He was still angry at his and Yuri's earlier exchange, it was evident as he tore off his armor, leaving it in an untidy heap beside one of the beds. Though he paid for one person occupying the room, a crowded city like Nordopolica always prepared for multiple people. Sword and shield he removed from his person next, though he placed them carefully on the bedside table, treating them better than he did his armor.

The sword had been a gift to him from his family upon his appointment as captain of the Guard. The shield had been given to him by Alexei himself, the imperial crest the symbol of the Royal Guard since its formation an unknowable number of years ago. The symbol of his responsibility to protect the royal family, no matter the circumstance, no matter the cost. He closed his eyes, a hand pressed to the crest engraved in the shield's surface.

He really hated it when Yuri was right.

There was a soft knock at the door. The door was concealed partly in shadow, silverly moonlight illuminating the rest of the room. The one who had knocked hardly waited for Luke to invite him or her inside; a tall man strode within, and Luke almost grimaced.

"What do you want, old man?"

Raven made a face, as if he had eaten a sour grape. "What, I can't just check up on a friend?"

"I paid for one occupant," Luke replied coldly, meaning it as an indication the other man should leave. But Raven instead waltzed his way further inside, planting himself on the bed on the other side of the room, directly opposite of Luke's.

"Then it's a good thing I paid for one more."

Luke groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose as if he had a headache—and perhaps he did. He sat on his bed, pulling off his shoes, which he left on the floor, next to the pile of armor. He didn't bother to completely remove his uniform, simply pulling the covers over himself as he settled in to sleep. Raven, legs crossed, leaning against his headboard, doing nothing more than looking on.

"Hey." He said softly, as if coaxing an injured animal that would as likely bite him as accept the offer of food from him, "I know he don't say it that nicely, but Yuri just means well. And it's not just that your job is protectin' tha princess. He's taken a a shine ta ya, too."

"Tch," Luke's voice emerged from the pile of covers across the room. "Is he one of those nutcases that push people away the closer they are to him? Sure didn't seem that way with the others." The covers moved, and Luke sat up, if only to deliver a venomous glare at Raven, his uninvited roommate. "Not even with you, you know?" He sighed, kneading his forehead with the heel of a palm.

Raven shrugged, managing to look a bit sagely even in his unkempt appearance. "He just doesn't want ya ta end up like he did. Givin' up on his dreams and responsibilities before he was really through. He even said it himself, though I don't think he'll say it again anytime soon. For a guy like him, once is enough, more than enough."

"He's too young to be thinking like that." Luke irritably replied, still massaging his forehead. "Ow. And then what they said bugs me, too. Why does Alexei want me at his side? It's not as if he needs me for anything. Hell, I'll be surprised if I don't get demoted for not properly guarding the princess, much less managing to get separated from my entire cohort." The solitary hand holding his head gained a companion as Luke recoiled, clenching his teeth as if he were having one of his periodic headaches.

"Maybe Yuri was right. Maybe I'm incompetent, that all Alexei installed me as captain for is because I'm a noble. I mean, look at Flynn. He's a commoner, and he's clawing his way up faster than an arrow's flight. He doesn't let anything stand in his way, not even his best friend. Ugh,"

"Hey, are you--? Hey!" Raven leapt up to his feet as Luke almost collapsed in on himself, cradling his head with the pain that ravaged it. But that's not why Raven stared with shocked eyes. As Luke struggled to overcome the pain of his headache, he began to emit a strange light, similar to Estelle when she used a healing arte, but not quite the same. With it came a strange sound, a high pitched screech that was gone as soon as it had come.

Outside, in the night sky, Brave Vesperia, the brightest star, shimmered.

--

A/N: Sorry it took so long to get his out haha. Been having a creative slump.


	5. Gladiator Games

A/N: Now Mieu finally joins the party! I really should have put him in after the Keiv Moc aer krene, but I hadn't been thinking of it then. This makes for a more amusing scene. Plus I get to flex my crossover muscles in this very fun chapter.

--

Luke knew ever since he could remember after his kidnapping seven years ago that he would occasionally suffer headaches, and at first while they had been just that, annoying pains, soon he began to hallucinate and hear voices. They'd been happening more and more frequently in the last year or so, and while he tended to confuse them with dreams, the doctors insisted he record what these voices say, as they might be bits of memories of his past. While it was plausible, Luke somehow doubted that. The voices were always saying weird things, nothing anyone would say to a noble prince of age ten.

And it was happening again, he realized as he awoke, blinking. Or rather, had happened. He remembered talking last night, to Raven as he so rudely imposed himself as Luke's roommate. What he said exactly escaped him, something about the Knights, being incompetent, and Flynn. His head still ached, merely an echo of the pain he felt hours ago, but he still winced at it. Unconsciously he grabbed for his diary. He had always kept one as soon as he could write again, at the doctors' urging in case he ever got amnesia again. While at first it had been because the doctors made him, he would have written it anyway because he had fallen so deeply into the habit.

Diary and pen in hand, he didn't bother finding a table, preferring instead to write where he was in the bright sunlight streaming in through the window. Many times before he couldn't recall what exactly the voices had said, but they'd been getting clearer and clearer with each headache, as if the person to whom the voice belonged were speaking into his ear.

"_Luke, fragment of my soul … heed my voice ….!"_

It was the first time the voice had spoken in a complete sentence, and in a sense that frightened Luke. The voices should just be hallucinations as a side effect of the intense headaches he suffered because of the trauma of his kidnapping, but it also felt so out there that just being kidnapped couldn't have been enough to cause it. No one knew what this phenomenon was or why it was happening. It scared him.

But though the voice had been no dream, he had in fact dreamed. When he was small, and still re-learning the very basics of life, he had regressed into a child-like state, that is to say, the state of a child younger than ten, Master Van had been there for him even before he began training him again. At first Luke had been frightened of him—a tall, imposing man with such a beard and eyebrows must have inspired timidity in any child. But to calm him, Van had sung. Luke closed his eyes, his mouth forming the words.

_Toue lei ze kuroa ryuo toue ze_

_Kuroa ryuo toue ze ryuo ne ryuo ze_

_Va ne ze lei …_

Yulia's hymns, Van had called them. As Luke learned more and more, grew older, Van had sung to him less, until he stopped entirely. Thus Luke had only vague memories of the complete song, remembering only bits and pieces. Sometimes when Luke was really down, Guy would sing to him, too, but though Luke always appreciated it, Van had sung it much more beautifully. But why would he have a dream of Van singing Yulia's hymns to him after blacking out from that headache? He shook his head, the world was full of unknowable mysteries.

But with that thought of Van's singing, with a pang he missed it. Because Van had sung them to placate his irrational fear of him as a child, Luke always associated those songs with calm, serenity, relaxation and peace. Van had told him once that Yulia's hymns were fonic hymns, that a Seventh Fonist melodist could sing them to help support his or her comrades in battle. But only those who understood the thoughts and feelings put into the hymns could use them as such.

Without that understanding, they were just songs. There weren't many melodists these days, as Daath throwing the whole empire into excommunication made those somewhat less popular. The empire had as much renounced the Score and the Order of Lorelei that day many years ago, and now the empire was beginning to forget it. Perhaps he could persuade Alexei to allow the training of melodists along with standard battle mages, if their association with the Score was forgotten as well.

Luke sighed, closing his diary. Though clearer than they had ever been, the words of the voice he always heard didn't mean anything. Something about his soul, and something about heeding his voice. That was simply absurd; he had been heeding it as it was quite comfortable with bashing his head in from the inside out. The doctors were all wrong; the voice was simply a hallucination like they thought, nothing more. He rose from the bed, reaching down to his bag to get ready for the day.

When he stood, a fluff of blue and white fur dropped to the floor, as if by moving Luke had displaced it. Alarmed, he stared at it, blinking owlishly. It was round and small, rather like a bunny. Also like a bunny, it had large floppy ears, sky blue tipped with white. Unlike a bunny, there were no buck teeth, and unlike a bunny, there was a golden ring about its waist, large enough to fit on Luke's arm. There was a resounding moment wherein Luke mouthed the words "what," "the," and a not so nice four letter word thereafter.

The creature's eyes were closed, and its breathing slow and rhythmic as if it were sleeping. And it had been, for at Luke's inquisitive poke from his foot, it stirred, opening large aqua eyes and stretching out on the floor as it yawned. Wobbling with the ring it wore, it stood on small paws, looked up at Luke in an irritatingly cute demeanor, and opened its mouth. Luke again muttered the curse he had not two minutes ago as this blue-rabbit-creature-_thing _spoke.

"Hi, Master! Did you sleep well? Do you always make marks in that thing? Do you like the color red? I guess you do, because your hair is red, and your clothes are red, but then your eyes are green, but they're complimentary colors so your clothes must bring out your eyes more and—"

"Whoa, wait, hold your horses!" Luke interrupted, trying to take a step back but cringing as his heels hit just solid bedpost. "Uh, did you say 'master'? 'Cause I'm not your master or anything like that … I don't even know wha—who you are!"

The tiny blue animal climbed Luke's leg, a remarkable achievement with such small limbs and the lack of thumbs. It sat itself on the bed, though even from this height it still couldn't see Luke at eye level. It gave a small bow. "That's easy, Master! I'm a cheagle, and my name is Mieu! The cheagle elder wanted the tribe to thank you for saving us two moons ago, and so I followed you the best I could! And here I am!"

Luke quirked a brow. "Saving you? When? I've never seen anything like you." Quietly he resisted the urge to punt the small creature like a ball at the sound of its high-pitched voice. Looking at Mieu, it looked like a rabbit, and where did rabbits live? The forest. Like the woods that enshrouded Dahngrest and Heliord, like the forest of Keiv Moc. He vividly recalled the surging aer there, how it made the monsters crazy. Then he gaped.

"Are you from the forest of Keiv Moc?"

Mieu nodded, chirping an affirmative. "Yes, Master! The cheagle elder told me to take the Sorcerer's Ring and find you and serve you for a cycle of the seasons as our show of thanks!"

"Sorcerer's Ring?" Luke asked, bending to examine the ring around Mieu's girth. "It doesn't look like Rita's ring …" It didn't look much like a blastia at all, either. Then Mieu spoke again.

"It belonged to Yulia! She gave it to our tribe before she went to stop the Great Dark! Cheagles can talk to you guys because of it! Isn't Yulia amazing? Mieuuuu!"

For once the strangeness of it escaped it Luke as he considered what the cheagle told him. Yulia had been credited for many inventions during the Dawn Age, together with the Krityans of Geraios, blastia and fonic technology—fontech, which was long lost to the empire much like blastia—not the least of them. He hung on one of the cheagle's phrases, the Great Dark. It sounded vague, but there was a disaster Yulia was given credit for lifting. In the Dawn Age, according to Daath's historians, there was a poison called the miasma. Through her reading of the Score, Yulia had found a way to purify the world by committing it to the skies above, far away from the land.

The empire had forgotten that, because it had renounced the Score. But not the entire empire. Not House Fabre. Finding the cheagle kind of cute even though it was kind of annoying, Luke ruffled its fur behind its ears, a small smile on his face.

"Well, she really is, Mieu. But why did you come to just me? Any one of the people with me who were there might have just as much claim to your service."

"I'll still help them all the best I can!" Mieu maintained, but the cheagle bowed its head slightly, as if entrusting Luke to a secret. "But I'd like to serve you, Master, because like us," it took in a deep breath, whispering, "you can use the Seventh Fonon."

Luke blinked. While it was a surprise in and of itself Yulia had known these creatures, much less given them a gift, it was something else entirely to know that these … cheagles could use fonons at all, especially the Seventh. Some intelligent animals and monsters were known to be able to use aer and fonons and form artes, but nothing like what this cheagle had indicated. Luke patted Mieu on the head.

"Okay, Mieu. You can serve me if you promise me, unless you absolutely have to, under the most dire situation, not to mention the Seventh Fonon to anyone else. All right?"

Mieu chirped, thinking nothing of it. "Sure, Mieuuu!"

With that, Luke turned to his belongings to dress, though all he really had to do was put his armor, sword and shield back on. When he saw his things, however, he was confused. Had someone moved them in his sleep? Instead of the untidy heap he had left them in the night previous, they were neatly placed in his own backpack, gauntlets, boots, greaves, shoulder plates, sword and shield. He turned to look at the bed across from him. It was empty, but it wasn't disturbed at all, not even a depression in the pillow to betray anyone had slept there. Somehow, Raven didn't seem like the type of man to take the time to make up the bed each morning, especially not when it didn't belong to him.

Luke shrugged it off. They didn't seem like very important details, and there was a great deal to do this morning. Delivering the Don's letter to the head of Pallestralle, the guild who ran the arena in Nordopolica, for instance. There was also the stellar prospect of going into the searing hot desert, wandering aimlessly looking for a gigantic bird that spoke. Yet Luke was no longer shocked that the bird, Phaeroh, could talk. Not after seeing Mieu speak, if only with the help of Yulia's ancient Sorcerer's Ring. In his book, the day blue rabbit-creatures spoke, anything was possible. Anything.

Strapping on his sword to his belt and the shield to his back, Luke was ready to go. He hoisted his bag, the opening undone enough for the cheagle within to breathe and look outside. He didn't intend to exactly hide the cheagle, it had to come out sometime after all, the bag was just a convenient way to keep track of it without it falling into serious danger. Luke had a thought. Karol's blastia was sewn onto the giant bag he carried; perhaps he'd like to be Mieu's keeper. The cheagle owed the boy as much as anyone else that had been in Keiv Moc that day.

While it wasn't first light, it was still early in the morning, the air of Desier already stiflingly warm even though it couldn't be later than eight o'clock. The continents where the cities of Dahngrest and Zaphias rested respectively had been quite cooler in climate; he was more used to intense cold than intense heat.

Shoulders sloping thinking of trekking through the desert later that day, Luke emerged from the shady arches of the business and residential circles, coming to the entryway of the arena that connected with the port. The others, Rita, Estelle, Karol, Repede, Judith, and—here Luke's jaw clenched—Yuri all stood together in a close knit oval, speaking among themselves. He made toward them when a cold hand latched onto his arm and pulled him back into the shade of the arches with surprising strength.

"Hey, what the hell—" His captor had not stopped moving, still holding Luke's arm with an iron grip, he was half dragged deeper in the business ring outside of the main arena, away from the others, away from the warming sunlight, into the cool darkness. Luke cringed as he was spun around, feeling his arm bruise above and below his elbow. His eyes froze, fixed on the face of his assailant. He yanked his arm away, hissing, "What do you want now? Damn that hurt," He gingerly massaged his arm where he had been dragged.

"For the love of Yulia's glorious curves, you seriously don't remember?" Raven demanded, arms outstretched to either side as he gaped like a fish, flabbergasted. "How ya got that headache last night? Remember that?"

"Yes, I remember," Luke replied in a low voice, his humor turned doubly foul. First Yuri had lectured him on his duty as an Imperial Knight—from a man who had left the Knights, of all things—now Raven was intruding on his privacy and then dragging him around the city, almost yanking his arm off in the process. Raven stared blankly at him, at a loss for words. For once, Luke thought with an inward smirk.

"C'mere, then. Somethin' ya gotta see." Without waiting for Luke to reply, Raven grabbed the knight's wrist and led him back to the inn where they had spent the previous night. Though one of the receptionists of the inn was awake, he seemed to be the only one who was at the moment, standing vigil to check people in and out. He quirked a brow at Raven coming back after he had checked out, with Luke in tow, but when the old man said he had forgotten something, the receptionist acquiesced.

Luke wasn't sure what the fuss was about, he knew he didn't forget anything. What had he to see in an empty traveler's lodge? Then Raven pushed open the door. It wasn't the room Luke had woken up in this morning, with a few blinks the young Fabre realized that. One of the far off towering structures in the distance beyond the window was closer to the right than he remembered seeing in the room he found Mieu. But his attention didn't remain out the window for long.

One of the beds, the bed he had settled into for the night, was completely warped. To say it was destroyed wasn't quite inaccurate, but nor it was completely gone. It was as if something or someone had taken a giant knife and sliced away parts of the mattress, its sheets, pillows, covers, half the headboard, and even some of the wall. All smooth edges, a clean knife cut. Except no knife could do this.

"I take it you understand what happened?" Raven asked, still standing by the door as Luke walked inside slack-jawed, staring at the disfigured furniture.

Luke nodded silently, not sure if he could speak. His tongue seemed glued to the roof of his mouth, his throat burning. Dimly he was aware that his knees began to shake slightly. But they shook. Tearing his eyes away from the bed, he found he could speak, if only a little.

"But … that's never … happened before …" he closed his eyes, taking deep breaths, as if when he next opened them, everything would be as it was. Leaning back against the door, Raven heaved a sigh, touching a hand to his forehead, making a little motion as if stabbing himself there.

"Jeez, when the Score said you'd be born with the power of Lorelei, I guess Yulia wasn't really kidding!"

The wave rolled over Luke and jolted him a little. He turned, anything to avoid looking at the items he had maimed. He was beginning to fill in the gaps. He had been in the throes of his headache, beginning to lose focus on what was around him, and after the damage had been done, Raven had oh so considerately relocated him to an empty room. But his ears rang with what the archer just said.

"You really must be old to remember the Score," Luke said feebly, but he also knew that Score, for House Fabre was the one exception to the empire's excommunication. If only because that particular portion of the Score had rendered them—him—so important. Raven gave him a deflated, almost disappointed, look.

"Well, yah, if you have ta say so," He waved a pointer finger at Luke reproachfully, "except that Score is most recent. What happened—and what will happen."

Unbidden the Score read to him leapt to Luke's mind. If he were in an imperial city he wouldn't have dared voice the prophecy aloud, as the Score had been banned as much as it had been denied the empire. But here there was no imperial power. Just a large guild running a large city full of joy-seekers from every walk of life.

"_ND 2000. In the Empire of Kimlasca shall be born one who inherits the power of Lorelei. He will be a boy of royal blood with hair of red. He shall be called the Light of the Sacred Flame, and he shall lead the Empire of Kimlasca to new prosperity."_

Raven nodded, affirming that Luke had recited the very Score reading that spoke about himself. The empire mentioned in the prophecy was undoubtedly the Empire Daath had later excommunicated, though for as long as anyone remembered nobody ever called it Kimlasca. Everyone always called it simply the Empire. As for the "Light of the Sacred Flame," it was common knowledge for those who knew Ancient Ispanian that it was the name "Luke," in that language.

"But," Luke turned a nervous glance from the maimed bed, then back to Raven. "I don't see how I'm supposed to do something like that … with that kind of power." He reflexively shuddered. Raven shrugged.

"It can mean any number of things. It can mean that yer supposed ta rise up to Commandant or Emperor, or you're supposed ta do somethin' heroic that would allow the people of the Empire to live in prosperity." The guildsman shook his head; pondering the mysteries of the world did not suit him. He turned to Luke, a bent frown on his face, looking genuinely concerned.

"Listen, Luke. I'm sure you've been told you're the only one in the world that can generate a hyperresonance by yerself. I'm sure you've also been told it would be useful for war.

But this is what you're being told now: _be careful. _Ya seem to lose control of yerself whenever you get one of those headaches … find someone to help you control that power. You'd be better off for yourself, and better equipped against those who want ta manipulate you."

"Don't say that! Don't ever say that!" Luke shouted, with such furor that Raven took a step back, jaw slack. "I—I'm not even a fonist! I'm just a knight! That's all! That's all …"

Raven scoffed, as if he were disgusted. Horribly, Luke knew that he was, even the old man who had shamelessly hid wine in his flask and stuck his eyes to anything that had curves on two legs. Suddenly deflated, Luke sank to floor, head bowed. Ashamed.

" 'Kay, kid, whatever floats yer boat. I can't help you if ya won't let me." After the way he had unceremoniously grabbed Luke before and half dragged him back here, the archer left. He simply walked away.

Alone in the room but for a little talking cheagle in his bag, Luke pulled his knees close where he sat, running his fingers through his hair. His red hair, red like blood. _Royal blood with hair of red. _He gripped clumps of his hair, pressing his face into his knees, eyes squeezed shut. He didn't want to acknowledge what Raven said was true. He didn't want to believe there would be those who wanted to manipulate him. In the empire that was just limited to those who wanted the throne, and as captain of the knights that guarded royalty, he was well out of the way. That would mean it ended there, right? Out of the way of the throne; the magistrates or Commandant could pick whoever else they damned well pleased, and it wouldn't matter to him one bit.

Mieu poked its head out of the flap of the item bag slung around Luke's shoulder, looking up curiously at him with perfectly round aqua eyes. "Master? Is something wrong, mieu?"

From beyond the hallways of the coliseum city, there was a melody, made strange by a simultaneously harsh and soft voice, but still Luke froze, breath hitched as it fell over his ears.

_Toue lei ze kuroa ryuo toue ze …_

But instead of feeling calm and serene, all Luke felt was an incomprehensible, tense knot of fear.

--

Despite everything, Yuri could not help but feel excited. Though their plans were delayed by at least half a day, perhaps more, it was a detour well worth taking. Even sent away from the Duce's door the night before (without Luke, as he had been quite eager to storm off ahead of them) with the notice that she only accepted visitors on appointment or on the night of a new moon, there was profit in the rest of Nordopolica.

The leader of the guild Ruins' Gate, Regaey, had approached them in the morning, asking them to take on a job for him. As a ruin freak like Rita that excavated blastia (with rather more respect to the ruins themselves than the young female mage would have), he held much respect for the Geraios civilization and the structures they left behind, the city of Nordopolica itself included. According to the Duce of Pallestralle, the gladiatorial games had been around in the city for thousands of years, ever since an ancient race first built them.

This ancient race, Regaey revealed in a stutter, was called the Entelexeia. It would be most disrespectful, the frail man said, if some villain going through the battle arena's ranks faster than an arrow's flight should get one step closer to taking over the city through the coliseum. Yuri wasn't sure if that was how Pallestralle worked, but it was good enough for everyone else, and hey, a job was a job. He was gonna get paid for smacking people around. How awesome was that?

"Captain Karol doesn't need to bother with this kind of stuff," Yuri said when the question of who was going to enter the battle tournament was thrown in the air. He'd been calling Karol that before they had met Luke, but the knight always seemed to think the nickname was meant to poke fun at him. Yuri nearly chortled, perhaps it was now. "And …" he glanced around to see Judith holding her spear, wine colored eyes bright with anticipation. "I'd rather not fight Judy." He said flatly.

"Awh," Judith's shoulders sloped down, her voice clearly betraying her disappointment. "That's no fun. I wanna fight, too!"

"And you'll have plenty of opportunity to fight later," Yuri assured her, eyeing the point of her lance with but a hint of nervousness. "We can always come back after our jobs."

"Yes," The Krityan nodded in agreement, but she never backed down so easily. "But our chances of trouncing this villain would be better if we both entered."

Yuri cringed. "Judy, you would just emasculate me in front of that whole crowd."

"Doesn't your hair already do that just fine?" Rita asked, smirking. Yuri rolled his eyes.

"Look, Regeay's covering the fee for only one fighter to enter, and we have better things to spend our money on at the moment. Let's get this job done, all right?"

"Oh, fine." Judith finally surrendered, lowering the point of her spear. "And I was looking forward to it, too."

_Oh you would, wouldn't you, _Yuri thought with a shudder, but he didn't say so out loud. Judith hit hard enough when they were staging their escape in Ghasfarost, and that had been play acting. He dreaded to think of fighting her, he who fought on the ground where she was at home in the air.

"All right," He said, shouldering his sword, "let's go kick some ass!"

-

Luke had been quick about leaving that uncomfortable room and following Raven. He'd left the others early, after all, and they still had business in this city. Guild business. He sighed, trailing the old man's shadow and soon enough he could see that messy ponytail, the splash of bright violet against the earth tones of the city that was his coat. Raven said he had wanted to help Luke. How? If there really were people out there trying to get their hands on Luke and his power, how would they go about it, how would they manage to control this power when he himself couldn't?

People couldn't really see the future, he thought grimly. The Score was a guide, a prophecy that would come true—_In the Empire of Kimlasca shall be born one who inherits the power of Lorelei_—but not even Yulia's Score had been so accurate as to explain every single little detail of this future she read. Yulia couldn't tell Luke who his enemies were, she couldn't tell Luke how they would harness his power, she couldn't tell Luke how to control his own power. Though, he thought with some bitterness, having summoned Lorelei itself to read her Score, surely Yulia must have known the full extent of that power.

He didn't notice that he was dragging his feet until he stumbled over a crack in the floor. He didn't fall completely, just to one knee, and that jarred him into awareness. An open hand came into his view, a large one covered in rough calluses, the skin made dark by both nature and years in the sun. Luke looked up at Raven, who tilted his head to one side, as if asking whether he would take the offer of help. Silently, Luke took the hand, and he was pulled to his feet. The old man gave him a small smile, which Luke couldn't quite return but nonetheless made him feel better. Perhaps he really did just want to help.

"C'mon, Brave Vesperia got another job here. They're gonna go kick some ass in the coliseum!" With a "whoo!" of excitement he jumped into a backflip, landing on his feet with a thumbs-up. If that was meant to psych Luke up, it didn't work; watching the old man so energetic only made him feel tired. But he nodded and followed Raven to the arena.

-

Of course Yuri was the fighter chosen to take on Regeay's job. Luke didn't particularly mind that, though he wondered why Judith was in the stands instead of taking part in the tournament too. While he wouldn't say so out loud (because he would be teased to no end for it), he actually admired Yuri's sword style. He could see the moves used by the Imperial Knights, but they were altered to suit Yuri's own liking, and he had many original attacks besides.

The others watched from the stands, cheering their champion on. Luke could see Estelle from where he stood, under the arch of the entrance, for he'd wanted to stand in the cool shade. For some reason, Raven stayed here under the arch with Luke, though he still cheered Yuri on. Before every battle, he called to the swordsman, "Show 'em what for, kid!" He would wave, and once Yuri had looked back at him, responding with a rather unenthusiastic wave of his own. Luke could see why: two battles in he was covered in cuts and bruises. However, that was all he suffered, his sliced down his opponents faster than they could blink three times.

Luke wondered as he watched Yuri fight the third opponent who this nefarious villain trying to overthrow Pallestralle was. The guild couldn't exactly throw him out according to their own rules if he really was the tournament champion, and hell, the champion was paying good Gald to continue fighting! The bit about the hostile takeover seemed pale In comparison to sheer amount of business they were getting from challengers wanting to topple the champion off his pedestal, and if they did, hooray, no more hostile takeover to worry about.

Finally, Yuri cut down his third opponent like he would a clump of weeds, the unconscious loser's body hauled off the arena floor by some of Pallestralle's lesser guildsmen. The emcee from his top box sang Yuri's praise, if it could be called praise; he emphasized the strong possibility of it being beginner's luck. While Luke had simply tuned out the emcee's commentary in all the fighting thus far, even he dropped his jaw when the name of the champion rolled over the crowd like thunder.

"_Flyyyyyn Scifoooooo!"_

"Oh, hell," Luke mumbled, slapping a palm to his face. Before he had dismissed Yuri's superstition that the newest Imperial Knight captain had been actually making efforts to stalk him across the earth, the tables turned from when Yuri's journey began when he and Estelle were doing the stalking. Now Luke had no choice but to believe it too. What was an Imperial Knight captain doing in the battle arena? Grunt knights he could understand, maybe a captain who wanted glory, but _Flynn? _Luke hadn't known Flynn very well or very long, and even he knew it wasn't at all like him.

Yet there Flynn was, sunlight splintering off his gleaming armor, azure sword and white shield in either hand. Standing there in the center of the arena floor, he looked very much the paragon of everything an Imperial Knight should aspire to be. But an Imperial Knight being there at all, much less Flynn, seemed so wrong.

For all the talk of their infamous rivalry, Yuri and Flynn did not clash swords immediately. They seemed to be—Luke shaded his eyes with a hand, squinting in the bright sunlight—talking. Luke blinked. Talking? Well, Yuri must want to know why Flynn was even here. But if the champion was Flynn …

"They weren't set up, were they?" Luke asked Raven, who was scratching his chin in thought.

"Maybe, unless the Empire wants to down Pallestralle." The old man replied with a shrug.

"Right after making peace with the Union?" Luke frowned. "I can't see that happening. But then, why is Flynn even here?"

"Who knows. You don't know what orders he could have; you've been gone from the Knights for a while."

"True." The Royal Guard captain's eyes flickered to Estelle, who looked just as surprised as the others of Brave Vesperia at the title match. As the others shouted for Yuri to kick Flynn's plated butt, the princess didn't look so sure who to root for. His eyes darted back to the rival pair on the arena floor, who still spoke instead of fought. To their credit it looked like they were fighting, but anyone who knew them even a little would tell their heart wasn't in it. Then it hit Luke as he studied Flynn's hard gaze, which scanned the coliseum as if he were looking for something. Or someone.

He stepped back into the shadows, just a little. "I think Flynn might be trying to take Estelle back to the Knights." _And me, _the thought rose unbidden but he didn't say so aloud. Raven made an uncertain noise.

"I'unno. Wouldn't this seem like a rather roundabout way of doin' that? If that's what he was here for, he'd have caught up with us and appropriated you two already."

Like with the headaches and the voices he heard in them, Luke found abruptly he didn't know why Flynn was here, couldn't even guess. And that scared him. He fixed his gaze to the fighters on the arena floor, who looked as if they were finally about to stop play acting and fight for real. Before either of them could land the first strike, the screeching of the emcee's microphone made them freeze.

Every head in the Nordopolica coliseum turned up at the top box, where the poor emcee was shoved aside by—Luke had to squint again—what looked like a teenager of moderate height dressed in black hemmed with green, head crowned with a shock of that same deep leaf color. The stranger had an odd mask that hid most of his face, but he seemed to smile as he leaned to talk into the microphone.

"Ahem, testing, testing! People of Nordopolica, you didn't pay good money to see a fake fight!" A resounding wave of "Boo!" crashed over Yuri and Flynn, both of whom had the decency to look abashed at being called out. "How would you like to make it just a little more interesting?" The new emcee's suggestion was met with a roaring shout of approval. That made Luke a bit nervous.

"Yeah! Let's do that!" Yuri hollered up to the top box, though only those close enough to him could hear it. The green-haired teenager saw him wave, even if he couldn't hear what the combatant had said. He nodded, smirking under his mask. Flynn threw Yuri a dirty look that seemed to say, "I'm going to _kill_ you," which was coolly ignored.

"All right, you've got it, people! For ever in this tournament all it's ever been was either one on one or one against a whole horde of foes! Now it's time to spice things up: how would you all like to see a _tag team battle?!"_

The resulting roar of various approving phrases ("YES YES OH GOD YES") was deafening; Luke clapped his hands over his ears, wondering if blood would spurt out of them anyway. He looked around the arena: Yuri was drinking in the audience's enthusiasm, Flynn was grimacing like he was going to be ill, he couldn't see the others in the stands because the audience was rising up in an incomprehensible mass of people, and Raven had an odd expression on his face. He couldn't quite describe it, it was as if the archer thought something bad was going to happen but it was completely out of his control to stop it.

The new green-haired emcee cleared his throat. "Just as skilled as the resident champion, here comes a swordsman who will act as Flynn Scifo's partner in Nordopolica arena's first tag team battle ever!" Right on cue emerged from the arches on Flynn's end of the battleground a tall man. Luke couldn't see his face, but he did see the black uniform and blood red hair. His stomach dropped.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I give you a God-General of the Oracle Knights—_Asch the Bloody!"_

-

"Okay, whatever's going on, it's definitely weird." Yuri murmured under the ill containted excitement of the crowds roiling in the stands like rough ocean waves. He stared at the black-clad teenager that had displaced the original emcee, his frown bent. "First Regeay sets us up, now this?"

"Yeah," Flynn nodded, wincing as the new emcee exclaiming his and Yuri's exchange of blows clearly faked. They had used those moments of clashing blades and deadlocks to talk a little bit, mostly Yuri asking what Flynn was even doing there, which the knight captain could not disclose. Then he blinked, jaw dropping when the audience shrieked with delight at the emcee's suggestion of a tag team battle. "A what team battle now?"

"Tag team," Yuri said with emphasis, as if his best friend were hard of hearing. "Well, he must be a pretty psyched up fan to ignore registration procedure." He cast his eyes about the arena and the people in it. "Just wish we knew who we're going to team up with." No sooner than he had finished with the sentence than he got his wish.

The teenager commenting announced Flynn's partner first. From his end of the arena walked in a young man of moderate height, the sunlight seeming to scald him instead of splinter off him as it had off Flynn when he had entered. This was probably because the newcomer wore a uniform of black, hemmed with red. A dark sword was belted to his waist, a long mane of scarlet falling down his back. Hard eyes, deep green like venom, scanned the battleground, and a cruel smirk donned his face.

"Oh, hell no," Yuri said through clenched teeth as the man's name—Asch the Bloody—echoed throughout the coliseum with almost rabid approval. Flynn quirked a brow at him, bewildered.

"You know this man?"

"Got a bone to pick with him, yeah." Yuri narrowed his eyes, and not because of the blazing sunlight. Flynn donned a thoughtful look, and would have stroked his chin if his hands were not full with sword and shield.

"Oracle Knight …? Why is one of them here, much less a God-General?"

"Didn't anyone in the empire say anything about them?" Yuri asked curiously.

Flynn shrugged. "Yeah, but Daath hasn't done anything for years. It left the empire alone, and the guilds too. Why now do they emerge from their obscurity?"

Fresh memories of Ghasfarost flashed through Yuri's mind. How this God-General, Asch, had single-handedly killed Barbos, leader of a master guild with an insanely powerful blastia weapon, and how he had beckoned Luke, and Luke alone, to step forward. Whatever Asch had wanted, it was obvious he didn't get it.

"I think," Yuri said softly as Asch drew ever closer, "that it might not be the entire Oracle Knights, just this guy." He gripped the hilt of his sword as Asch the Bloody drew his own, the gold patterns laid into the blade glinting with a blinding edge. "Though, I've been wrong before."

"And to fight beside Yuri Lowell of the guild Brave Vesperia –" here the emcee paused, clearing his throat. "Well, I'd volunteer, but commenting on matches is serious business. However!" He paused for dramatic effect, which worked well as the audience leaned in toward the top box, eager for the announcer's next words. Yuri thought he could see a cruel smirk on the masked boy's face. "It is my understanding that …" He rummaged in his pockets, and withdrew a folded square of paper.

"Oh good lord," Yuri's features became sheepish as he hid his face in a palm. He knew what that paper was, what it would say. And he had a feeling who would be called down from the stands into the battleground. The new emcee read from the paper with a flourish.

"Yuri Lowell has kidnapped and coerced into submission the captain of the Imperial Knights' Royal Guard! Who, I ask you, has done such a thing on that scale?! Ladies and gentlemen, the one who will accompany Yuri Lowell on the battlefield is none other than the man himself_, Luke fon Fabre!"_

The coliseum exploded with impossibly loud noise, almost a riot. They were even throwing coins of Gald to the floor, willing to turn out their pockets for the juicy entertainment that was the captain of Commandant Alexei's personal unit fighting in a team alongside the very man who had abducted him. Last night Yuri had teased Luke for the description in the wanted poster; to bystanders it had looked as if he kidnapped both princess and knight captain. But now, the lie echoing across the entire city with uproarious laughter, Yuri could feel the shame emanating from Luke.

-

Luke wanted to curl up in the nearest corner and die of shame when the teenager emcee shouted his name—and the lie from the wanted poster—across the arena grounds. The audience found the prospect of the captain of Alexei's own personal unit fighting for the man who had kidnapped him so rich they turned out their pockets to throw Gald coins to the arena floor. The air shone with gleaming sparkles as the coins fell in a veritable rain.

"Perfect." Luke groaned, face flushed beet red. "Now the whole city thinks I'm an idiot. I'm supposed to be the leader of Alexei's elite force, and they think Yuri of all people kidnapped me!" He kicked dust into the air, fists clenched in frustration. "I don't care what that kid up there says! I'm not doing it. Just—no!"

"I think you'd better do what that kid says." Raven replied in an uneasy voice. Enraged, Luke whipped around, a snappy retort on his lips, but he stopped. Raven was not facing him, his back to Luke as he stared into the arch's shadows that led out of the fighting arena. Luke couldn't see anything much, no sunlight reached that far. He heard the clinking of plate armor, saw the gleam of a sharpened sword as it came out of the darkness and into the light.

"Wh-what the …" Luke stepped back, his left hand, his sword hand, automatically flying to the short sword belted to his back. He could see the strangers clearly now as they slowly stepped forward. He was expecting Imperial Knights, but these soldiers' armor and uniforms were not of those under Commandant Alexei's command. "Did you know about this, too, old man?" He wanted badly to swear but chose not to. The Don's right hand man sighed.

"Luke, please," Raven said as he rolled his eyes, his tone more along the lines of "Bitch, please," rather than that of someone actually pleading. He yanked his knife out of his belt, grabbing for an arrow as the enemy knights took a few steps closer. "I don't know why the Oracle Knights are here any more than you do. _Wind Blade!"_ With a flick of the wrist whose hand held the knife, a gust of air knocked one of the Oracle Knights, mantled in black with gold borders, to the ground, his sword clattering out of reach on the tiled surface.

But over the body of the incapcitated Oracle Knight stepped a large boot. Raven and Luke's eyes simultaenously flew up to stare the newcomer in the face—an impossibly large man towered over them like a giant, his muscled body almost filling up the archway. Though his uniform was unique, it echoed the Oracle style, so there was no doubt the Knights Raven had insisted on fighting were his men. Across his amazingly broad shoulders he hefted a scythe twice as long as one of Judith's spears, the blade a cruel arc of cold steel. The man had more a mane of metal grey hair than anything else, the fierce burning of his eyes under a heavy brow rather reminiscent of a lion.

It had happened so fast. Raven made to launch three arrows at once, each of which the giant Oracle Knight deflected with ease, sparks flying as the metal arrowheads touched his scythe blade. He lunged forward, holding up his weapon to swing—Raven folded his bow, where blades attached at either end of his bow formed a short sword when they met. But even a transform bow was useless against this monster of a man, who sliced through the bow like it was so much firewood, and next thing Luke knew Raven was thrown back against the stone wall, the Oracle Knight's scythe just a scant few inches from his vulnerable neck. In his shock the old man even dropped his knife, when he had always carried it.

The quiet thud as it fell into the dust was deafening.

"Raven!" Luke shouted, though his cry was almost lost amid the audience's hollering, who were getting impatient as the one announced to support Yuri in his tag team battle was not showing up. The giant man with the mane of a lion turned his intense gaze to the red-haired noble, a deep jagged frown on his face.

"So that's the best Heaven's Arrow can do?" Large shoulders heaved as the man laughed, his voice as impossibly deep as his titanic stature. "What a joke you guilds are. You," He indicated Luke with a nod of his head. "Get yourself on that battleground unless you want this old man's head to roll."

"Oh come on, do I really look that—augh!" Raven bit off his protest when the giant man's scythe scratched the stone of the wall, drawing ever closer to his neck. "Luke, dearie, I really, really think you should do that. Right now. Run along!"

Despite that he never really quite liked Raven, Luke found he didn't want him to die either. His mouth went flat into a grim frown. If he didn't go, the lion-man would kill Raven. If he did go, the lion-man might kill Raven anyway. He grit his teeth, frustrated beyond belief. The old man's eyes locked with his own, and Luke saw a real glimmer of fear in them.

He scoffed, unable to believe he really was going to leave Raven's life in the hands of that monster. As he turned, walking into the sunlight to take his place beside Yuri to enthusiastic cheers from the crowd, he knew that these Oracle Knights were up to something. They wouldn't extend themselves so far just for gladitorial games.

"You took your sweet time," Yuri said with a humorous smirk when Luke halted beside him, shield and sword in hands. Luke didn't smile, the frown engraved on his features.

"Let's just get this over with."

The emcee's shout of "Begin!" fell on deaf ears. Everything around him, the shrieking crowd, the voices of encourgement picked out as the voices of their friends under the screaming surface, even Repede's barking, became incomprehensible white noise to Luke. All he knew was to have his shield at the ready, and swing his sword.

The battle was a rather hectic blur more than anything else. Of course over their journey so far Luke had dueled with his companions, practiced with Yuri, helped Estelle with sword and shield, and they even split into two teams and sparred that way. But Luke had never been in a tag team battle, much less with Yuri against his best friend and the stranger—the emcee called him Asch the Bloody—that had killed Barbos and assaulted them on top of Ghasfarost. Like he had on the blastia tower, Asch fell back behind Flynn, the glow around him betraying the use of magic—fonic?—artes.

Remembering Master Van's training and Alexei's later on, Luke lunged for Asch, to stop whatever elemental arte he was building. When mages and fonists could be as strong as Rita, they were always priority number one in a fight, to be protected on his side, and cut down on the other. But Flynn was also a captain of the Imperial Knights. Lightning quick he abandoned his deadly dance with Yuri, azure steel clanging against Luke's shield as he managed to bring it up just in time to avoid being slashed. Flynn's eyes, an astonishingly deep shade of blue, pierced into Luke's own emerald ones with an almost accusatory gaze. Luke blinked. For what?

He didn't have time to dwell on it, as Yuri had shouted at Flynn, "Hey, over here!" and fired an Azure Storm in his direction. Luke leapt backward as his partner rushed the blond knight, forcing another engagement. It was too late, however, to stop Asch's forming magical arte; as if in a mocking tribute to their encounter on Ghasfarost Spire, jagged pillars of ice rained from the sky. He had to run to save himself from being impaled, though it was much easier to outrun them in the open. But as he heard the crash of ice splitting on the ground, almost like glass, he knew he had gotten separated from Yuri. Just as they had on top of Ghasfarost, sheer walls of ice penning him into a makeshift enclosure.

Rita's magic wasn't here to save them this time. The jagged ice walls were too solid, even in the sweltering heat of Desier's sun. Luke had been trained not only in brute force, but also in the handling of fonons. While he couldn't quite pull off a true fonic arte, he knew how to gather up enough for a powerful strike, and modify an existing attack with it. Master Van had called this tenique a usage of fields of fonons, where one drew in ambient fonons around them and channeled them to alter a physical attack or fonic arte. Some even knew enough to change their magical artes with blastia. Yulia knew there was enough heat and light around on the continent of Desier, so Luke made use of the Fifth and Sixth Fonons around him.

A Burning Havoc was just enough to cleave one of the ice barriers, not to destroy it completely but reduced the walls' effectiveness as a means of trapping him in. Yuri was no fool; he also knew that Asch was the greatest threat as he had more than just a sword at his disposal. Thus when the walls of ice hit the floor, he took advantage of that confusion and manuevered around Flynn in an effort to find Asch, while the poor Imperial Knight captain cried out in frustration.

That, Luke realized suddenly, was Flynn's weakness—he and his partner were complete strangers, unfamiliar with one another's fighting styles. Luke and Yuri, however, had been fighting side by side for two and a half months now, they knew how to use their strengths and make up for one another's weaknesses. They knew how to set up their enemy and cut them down.

One of Yuri's favorite tactics—Yuri's, not Luke's at all—was that Luke, being the tough and almighty Imperial Knight he was, take on the role of bait. When the enemy was focused on bringing Luke down, Yuri would swoop in with a flurry of sword slashes so quickly the light bending off his sword made a blinding edge. This strategy applied perfectly in this battle, as Luke busied himself gouging out chunks of the ice walls by imbuing his sword and shield with Fifth Fonons. He could almost sense Yuri circling around him, beyond the icy trap.

He heard fragments of ice crushing under someone's boot. He was effectively penned in despite the progress he was making in bringing the walls down. It was either Flynn or his impromptu partner, Asch. Just by the way he heard the footfalls he knew it wasn't Flynn; the blond knight wasn't the type to stalk his enemy like a leopard would its prey. Luke sidestepped away from the wall he was hacking at, his back to the barriers he had managed to rend apart so he would have a way to escape the maze of ice. But as he saw the mane of red hair through a particularly clear sheet of ice, he heard Asch's cold voice.

"There's no escape. _Icicle Rain!"_

Drafts of frigid air whirled around him, whipping his clothes as blocks of ice fell to the earth, shattering behind Luke, filling the escape route he had carved out with jagged debris. It was unnatural, the way even the first bulwark of frost had not altered in the least under Desier's unforgiving sun. Cursing, Luke grabbed for more Fifth Fonons, slicing away as much as he could. He lifted his sword to strike down another wall, only to have it break apart in front of him; he held up his shield to deflect stray pieces of ice. Luke lunged forward with his shield, knocking aside Asch's sword, soon enough blade clashing blade, sparks falling in a bright shower to the stone floor.

Certainly more skilled than the average soldier, Asch bore down on Luke with such force that it was all the Royal Guard captain could do to deflect the strikes with his own blade alone. His foot caught on a piece of ice, and he lost his footing. Black steel struck grey, and Luke blinked, almost nose-to-nose with the God-General. In the course of the battle Asch's bangs, which had been swept up before, had fallen over his forehead, much like Luke's would, except they swirled in the opposite direction. Hard green eyes, dark like venom, struck Luke like a blow—they were exactly like his. Their faces were the same. At first he thought he was just imagining it in the heat of battle, but the walls of ice penning them in close together showed Asch's face a thousand times in a hundred different angles, every one of which was identical to Luke's in every way.

_It was like looking in a mirror._

"Take a good look, dreck," Asch ground out through grit teeth, knocking Luke's sword aside. The Imperial Knight was too shocked to remember to block the oncoming slash, so hypnotized by the bizarre reflection of flesh before him. Luckily for him, he didn't need to block.

In a blinding flash of light, the prison of ice Asch had carefully built was shattered completely, the force of the blow flooring the two knights. A number of feet away from them were Yuri and Flynn, whose swords were still deadlocked, but with surprise they lowered their weapons. The radiance of the sudden blast of light dimmed, until it shrank to a recognizable form, that of a man wielding wicked daggers slick with poison, his hair dyed three different colors and a distorted, half-crazed expression for a face.

Yuri made a face as if he had swallowed a particularly sour lemon. "Oh good lord, not him again!"

Luke scurried to his feet, putting as much distance between himself and Asch as possible. Sword at the ready, he was rather glad to be at Yuri's side. "You know him? He's … different." That was a pathetic way to describe the strange man, one of whose arms was outfitted with a gross mechanism. With a shock Luke realized what it was. "He's … got a blastia on his arm!"

Yuri simply buried his face in his hands. "Why me, why me …?"

As if on cue, the man with the blastia arm took one of his daggers and thrust it in Yuri's direction, crying out for all to hear, "Hahaha! How do you like my new arm, Yuri Lowell? You did this to me, and this time I will have your blood for sure!" Luke blinked in disbelief.

"Your blood? What the hell did you to him, Yuri?!"

"Kicked his sorry ass twice before, and now he wants a third helping!"

Luke cast his gaze up into the arena stands: he saw Estelle and the others trying to get past the thick knots of people who had begun for all intents and purposes begun to riot to no avail. Even Judith, who was mercilessly knocking people down in an effort to help out her endangered friends, couldn't make her way fast enough.

"_Die!" _The man, whose name was Zagi as Luke had discovered later, charged with a speed belying the way he looked with the bulky machine on his arm. But before he could get to either Luke or Yuri, he was stopped by a lightning quick stroke of a black blade inlaid with gold. Recovering from the energy blast that knocked him down earlier, Asch's face contorted in rage as he stared down Zagi, holding his own even as the assassin held up his blastia arm, gathering aer for another attack. Before Zagi's arm had quite finished with its aer processing, Asch sent him staggering backward, and he yelled,

"What the hell do you think you're doing?! We were in the middle of a battle before you butted in!"

"Argh, get out of my way or I'll just cut you down too! I've only got a bone to pick with Yuri Lowell!"

"Only a handful of men alive could cut me down and you're sure as hell not one of them!"

"I beg to differ! Bring it on!"

Thus Zagi seemed to forget about Yuri, at least while this new opponent stood in his way, and Asch completely forgot about Luke in favor of the one who had so rudely interrupted. The audience had obviously approved greatly at this second turn of the unexpected, despite the fact it clearly was not organized for the tournament in the first place.

"C'mon," Yuri hissed to Luke, "let's get the hell outta here!"

Luke didn't need the telling twice. He ran alongside Yuri, making a beeline for the arena's exit. They skid to a stop as the body of a heaving monster flew past their heads, crashing into the tiled ground. The stench of monster blood was made all the worse under Nordopolica's sweltering heat. Out from under the cool archways of the entrance scurried Raven, clutching his knife preciously to his chest, but bowless. Yuri quirked a brow, bewildered.

"The monsters for the arena were let loose!" Raven shouted in explanation. No sooner than he finished his sentence did the gates of the arena flood with packs of beasts, wolves, bears, boars, anything and everything Pallestralle managed to capture and bring back.

"Old man! What happened to your bow?" Yuri's voice was almost lost in the fresh roars of panic the previously excited audience had emanated. Amazingly the emcee's microphone still managed to sound over the incredible noise, though it was not the first emcee's voice or that of the green-haired teenager echoing through the city. It was Flynn's voice as he ordered his brigade of knights to round up the monsters and assist in evacuating civilians. "Man, he even sounds like a captain already."

Raven's shoulders sloped, frowning pathetically when he thought of his transform bow, splintered to mangled bits by the giant Oracle Knights' scythe. "Suffice it to say the only thing I'll be usin' is my trusty ole' knife." He stepped back just far enough to avoid the lunge of a lupine monster, and stabbed with his dagger for all the good it did. The beast shrugged it off like it was nothing, turning back on the vulnerable archer. Luke sliced through it with a Fang Blade, and the redhead barked at Raven:

"Then stop gawking and go get another one! There's weapon racks lined along the walls all over! It's a _coliseum_ for Yulia's sake!"

While Raven nodded and carved a path toward such a rack holding bows with Wind Blade, Rita had managed to blast her way through the spectators with a well-placed Splash. While the gap in the knots of people didn't last long, it was long enough for Judith to vault down, Repede following suit, Rita to help Estelle negotiate the stone seats and walls, and for Karol to unceremoniously fall nearly flat on his face. They regrouped in the center of the arena, knights Imperial and Oracle fighting back the waves and waves of monsters.

"They just never stop coming!" Karol shrieked, waving his mallet around. He struggled with it and it was heavy, but he managed to crush the bones of unfortunate monsters. Estelle had her hands full showering healing artes on her companions, most of whom were tiring quickly, especially Yuri as he had been fighting since before afternoon. Judith fought with full force, a gleeful smile on her face as her lance threw monsters back left and right.

"There has to be some end to it, there just has to!" Rita stood beside Estelle in the very center, protected by all the melee fighters. Raven soon joined them, a new transform bow in hand that looked similar to the one he had lost. Aery light glowed around the genius mage as she built up a powerful magical arte; she made to unleash its fury when the core in the blastia torque around her neck flickered.

Fireballs shot every which way, hitting monster and knight of either army indiscriminately. At once most everyone threw themselves the floor, including Rita herself. Why, Luke thought as searing heat scalded his shield, was he always in the warpath of some angry mage or another? Did he do something in the past to make the mages unite for the sole purpose to destroy him with magic?

"What the hell!" Rita shouted, ducking under her own fiery storm of magic. "I've _never_ lost control of my magic before!"

"Not that I'm complainin', mind," Raven grinned, observing the monsters falling like flies first to the magic then the finishing strikes of the knights that were still standing.

There was an odd glow of light blue, and all eyes turned to Estelle, who was holding the little red box they had found aboard the Atherum. The light was shining even though the solid wood, and there was a strange humming noise thrumming in the air. The princess looked it, worried. "Could it be this box causing it?"

No sooner than the words were out of her mouth than a figure rushed past her, bowling her over, but leaving her unharmed. The box, however …

"Hey! That son of a—"

"Regaey's stealing it!" Karol hollered just in time to blot out Rita's vehement string of curses.

Immediately Repede loped after the thief, Judith following suit. One by one the others took advantage of the chaos, escaping the arena. Luke made to go in the same direction when the scarlet uniform of the Royal Guard caught his eye, somewhere in the maelstrom of monsters and knights, Oracle and Imperial. Flynn had taken Luke's cohort to Nordopolica as well? The Guard was Alexei's personal force; they only moved on his or the captain's command. The warrant for Yuri's head came to mind, how Alexei made it seem like Luke had been kidnapped, and he was to be returned to the Commandant as soon as possible.

Did Alexei have any particular orders for Luke besides the instruction to procure apatheia, whatever it was? Was that why he wanted Luke brought before him? Raven's words earlier that morning echoed in his mind, dulling the clash of monsters and knights to meaningless noise.

_You'd be better off for yourself, and better equipped against those who want ta manipulate you._

_Why did he make you captain of his Royal Guard?_

Images of the warped furniture flashed before his eyes. What should he do? Should he stay, rejoin his cohort, maybe meet up with Alexei if the Commandant was someplace near Nordopolica? Should he take his knights and find Estelle, to help protect her and then escort her back to the capital after she met with Phaeroh? Or should he do nothing and stay the course he had been set on after Dahngrest?

_If you're not necessary to the Knights, then isn't protecting her with all your strength all you truly have?_

"Luke! Let's go already!" Raven's urgent voice snapped Luke from his thoughts, and the archer waved for the others to slow down. "Hello? Wait up!" The redhead grimaced but he followed the Don's underling, trailing after Yuri and his companions.

For now at least he would accompany and protect Estelle. He had said as much last night when they berthed in the Coliseum City. But then he started to wonder … why was Raven, a guildsman of the top master guild in Dahngrest's Union, showing such an interest in him? He had said he only wanted to help, but who was to say he wasn't the Don's spy and device for putting tension in the Knights by pitting the Commandant's subordinate against him? But that didn't make sense; the Don wanted peace between the guilds and the empire just as much as he had.

_I was his pawn once, and it landed me in a place I wouldn't wish on hell's worst occupant._

Or maybe … maybe Raven really did just want to help.

--

A/N: cutting it off right here because it's freaking long enough as it is. Twenty pages on Word lol. Sorry that so much was happening at once in the arena event; I tried to make it as chaotic as possible.


	6. The Weasand of Cados

A/N: How I enjoy warping sooo much of ToV's geography lol.

--

"He got out of the city," Judith said, obviously dismayed. The others caught up with her shortly after escaping from the hellish chaos that had enveloped the arena. "Repede is still after him."

"Hopefully he won't lose the trail," Yuri said, giving an irritated sigh. It was true, they had no idea what was in that little red box; the name 'clear ciel crystal,' raised more questions than answers. But that didn't change the fact they had found it aboard the Atherum, and for whatever reason, Regaey had stolen it. Yuri did not like being a victim of theft.

"Just what is the clear ciel crystal?" Estelle asked, remembering the way the contents of the box had shone with such a strong light not even solid wood could contain it. "And why would Regaey …"

"He seemed so polite." Karol said mournfully, his image of the master of Ruins' Gate completely shattered. At this Raven adopted a thoughtful expression, murmuring something not quite audible to everyone else.

"Yeah, well, he didn't seem so polite when he was making off with that case." Rita folded her arms. "Whatever was inside it made my magic go absolutely haywire."

"There's definitely something bigger going on." Yuri added, holding a hand to his chin as he thought. "Regaey used us to keep Flynn from carrying out his orders, too."

"Orders?" Estelle clutched her hands to her chest, an apprehensive frown on her face. Yuri shook his head.

"He's not here to recapture any princesses." He stole a glance at Luke, who was standing a little ways apart from everyone else. The red-haired teenager didn't even seem to be listening, locked in his own little world. "Or any errant knight-captains." Even at the blatant reference Luke said nothing.

"And while you're all chatting," Raven spoke up after finishing his mumbling monologue, "he's gettin' farther and farther away. We should be, y'know, chasing him?"

Karol's voice prevented anyone from heading off right away. For all his clumsiness and cowardice, it was times like these he really showed what he was made of. "But if he left the city, he can't have taken a ship. The only way for him to go is through the northwest mountains, through the city of Akzeriuth."

Judith nodded. "Yes, it's as if he's heading to the desert; one would have to pass through it to get there."

"But Akzeriuth …" Karol knit his brow, obviously worried. "It's not Empire territory. I mean, it used to be …"

"Oh yeah, I heard about that." Luke said, finally breaking from his reverie. Before he could say any more, Estelle took up the mantle.

"Yes. A long time ago, after the Dawn Age fell, the Empire used to rule the whole world. But there were disputes from within, and the imperial family splintered. Half the Empire proclaimed itself independent, and started calling itself the Malkuth Empire." She started with Yuri burst into chuckles.

"Wow, Princess, you sure you didn't just devour the castle library?"

"I-it's not funny! There was nothing else for me to do, and there was so many interesting things to learn--!" She broke off when Yuri held up a hand with a silly smile, indicating he meant no harm. She stood down, but still bristled, almost pouting.

"Anyway," Karol resumed where he had left off, "Akzeriuth is Malkuth territory, and they've never liked the Empire."

"Indeed." Judith interjected. "Most of us are guildsmen, but we do have an Imperial Princess, the Royal Guard captain, and an Imperial mage."

"Yeah," Karol nodded. "What if they won't let us through? If we can't get to the desert we can't take Estelle to Phaeroh."

"We'll deal with that when it comes," Yuri said, pointedly not looking at Raven as the old man glared at him, clearly meaning less talking more chasing even if he never voiced it aloud. "For now let's just follow along and hope we'll run into Regaey."

As they moved out, Yuri glanced over his shoulder, half-expecting Luke to be standing where he had been. To his surprise the crimson clad knight was following along, though the look on his face told Yuri something was wrong. Never in the time they'd traveled together had he seen Luke so down. Though it was inconsiderate, Yuri decided that whatever it was, it would have to wait until they chased down Regaey and recovered the clear ciel crystal.

-

Flynn looked on with a grim satisfaction as his knights scurried about the arena. Most of the monsters had been dealt with, though certainly Pallestralle was not happy that some idiot had let them loose. Now they'd have to go forth and gather up more beasts to make up for those they had lost in the assault. It would be a while before they'd have enough monsters to hold another tournament.

The other knights that had appeared in the ring, the Oracle Knights, had made themselves scarce shortly after the monsters overran the arena. The only Oracle Knight that had stuck around was his impromptu tag battle partner Asch the Bloody, but he'd stayed long enough only to knock the assassin Zagi unconscious. Then he was gone like all the others, leaving the Imperial Knights to clean up the mess, and deal with Pallestralle's foul mood.

Flynn listened to the Duce's right hand man, Natz, as he explained the guild master's displeasure at the blow done to the guild city's activities but also her graditude for Flynn's quick action. Had he or his knights not acted, many of the spectators from all around the world would have been injured and killed.

"Is there any chance of an audience with the Duce?" Flynn asked, though in his heart he didn't exactly look forward to it. Natz shook his head.

"I'm afraid not, Sir Scifo. She only receives guests on the night ofa new moon." A small smile pulled his lips. "Though what with the Empire makin' peace with the Union, it's not surprising an emissary like yourself would come to see her. It … really makes me glad. Perhaps there's hope for the Empire and guilds after all."

Flynn could say nothing in response to that. Luckily he didn't have to anyway, for at the moment his second in command, Sodia, appeared beside him. He nodded to acknowledge her as she saluted, and she spoke.

"Captain Flynn, sir, the Schwann Brigade has come across some information that would concern you."

"What is it, Sodia?"

Her frown was bent, and she clenched her fists as if she were ready to go into a furious rage. "Some merchants came from Mantaic, and they brought news of the town. It's the Cumore Brigade …"

Flynn felt his temper flare as he listened to Sodia's recount. Had that fruity idiot of a captain not learned his lesson from Heliord? His behavior reflected badly not only on the nobility but on the Imperial Knights as a whole! Why, if Flynn hadn't met Lady Estellise, he would have been of the belief that all nobles were just as bad as Cumore! He paused.

Lady Estellise … and Luke fon Fabre as well. Despite the fact he felt Luke had abandoned the Knights, he had seen that he was truly doing his job the best he could, even if he didn't have his unit with him at all times. His job was to protect Lady Estellise, he was willing to strike out away from the Knights to do just that. Flynn had … Flynn had shirked his duty, simply leaving Her Highness in Yuri's care.

He had used to think most nobles were worse than good, honest commoners, but after seeing Luke and the lengths he was willing to go to fulfill the purpose given him, he began to reconsider. Not all nobles were bad. But ones like Cumore simply could not be allowed to abuse innocent commoners anymore. He looked to Natz, apologetically for leaving him hanging.

"At ease, Sodia. Well, Natz, it appears meeting your Duce would have had to wait. Please send her my regards." He bowed his head.

"I will, Sir Scifo," Natz replied, returning the nod as a gesture of respect.

Flynn turned to the woman knight beside him. "Sodia, prepare the men to leave at once. We're marching to Mantaic!"

-

Chasing after the thief that had taken the box with their mysterious crystal would have been infinitely easier if they had a vehicle of some sort, perhaps horses to ride. But there had been no time to get any mounts even if they had owned some, and since it was established there was only one way for Regaey to go, it was only a matter of time before they caught up.

The pace Yuri, Repede, and Judith set was nigh on merciless, more so on Estelle, Karol, and Rita than Raven and Luke, the latter of which had experience in tireless pursuit before. The poor Princess probably had never run so hard in her life, and though Karol was good at running, he was little more than a boy with less than stellar stamina, and it went without saying the Imperial mage had spent more time sitting down doing her research than on her feet.

But still they all managed to press themselves forward. Woe to the monsters that found themselves in their way, cleaved before they could so much as blink. They even caught a few stray Oracle Knights, undoubtedly the men of the God-General that crashed the tournament. Though the Oracle Knights refused to talk, their presence betrayed the fact that Asch the Bloody was also headed toward Akzeriuth.

"But why?" Estelle asked curiously. "First he was at Ghasfarost, he came to Nordopolica, and now he's headed to the same place we are?"

"We know next to nothing about what Daath's up to," Luke replied, the first thing he'd said since they left the Coliseum City. "The Order of Lorelei and the Empire have been on bad terms for years."

"It wouldn't have something to do with their so-called prophecy, would it?" Yuri asked, his pace slowing just a little bit. They were nearing the mountains out of which the mining city had been carved, even from their current distance they could see the quarries and terraces. He remembered how Luke and Estelle had said before that the Order of Lorelei had held following their prophecy the highest virtue.

"Prolly," Raven answered when Luke didn't. "Oracle Knights haven't been seen in either Empire or guild turf ever since the excommunication."

"Will it interfere with what we're doing?"

Raven shrugged uncertainly. "That depends on what the Score says."

Yuri sighed, putting a hand to his forehead in exasperation. "We already have one bunch of knights to worry about. We don't need another one."

"So you're saying ignore any more Oracle Knights?" Rita asked, her head tilted to one side curiously. She was a little surprised, but then again, Yuri had advocated stepping around the Hunting Blades in Caer Bocram, even if it had done little in the end.

Yuri nodded, his brow slick with sweat. Everyone was feeling the heat of the continent, but they went on with the motivation that cool shade in the mountains was near. "Yeah, that's exactly what I'm saying. We don't have anything to do with them."

"Ah, but we do." Judith said softly, but loud enough that everyone had heard it. Yuri slowed to a halt, turning to look at her with a quirked brow. Not bothering to stop herself, walking past him, she continued, "It seems they're interested in our own Imperial Knight."

"Luke?" Yuri knit his brow together, not quite understanding. "What would they want with him? I thought it was that Asch guy acting by himself."

At that Raven laughed, almost snorting in his sardonic amusement. "Oh, hell no. There were two more God-Generals there besides Asch. Largo the Black Lion, who I've had the pleasure of pinning me with a giant scythe, and Sync the Tempest." His face became sheepish. "Sync was, uh … commenting for that last fight."

"You know these God-Generals by sight?" Rita demanded, growing haughty as she always did when she set out for knowledge. "I've never even heard of them before."

Raven shook his head, sighing. "That's cuz you're a young'un. And Daath removed itself from the Empire before you were even born. You go to Daath and ask anyone and they'd tell you all about the Six God-Generals."

Karol blanched. "There's six of them!? Even the Imperial Knights only have, what, four captains?"

"Yeah," Raven nodded. "They each have their own divisions to command. Legretta the Quick, Sync the Tempest, Largo the Black Lion, Arietta the Wild, Dist the Reaper, and Asch the Bloody. They all report directly to the Commandant."

"So, Master Van has something to do in Akzeriuth?" Luke asked quietly, talking to himself more than anything else. True to professionalism, Van had not disclosed much of his work life with his student, since during the times he visited and trained Luke, he was not Dorian General Grants but rather Van Grants, the man who was Luke's mentor. He'd never mentioned the God-Generals by name or title, but he did say he had subordinates.

"But Judy," Yuri protested, mood turned foul by the heat and the relentless pace they had been chasing Regaey's trail, "why would you think they want Luke?"

"Exactly the reason the elder gentleman had said," The Krityan replied innocently, a hand touched to her collarbone. "The first time it had been Asch by himself, but today he was not by himself. Two other God-Generals and their men were with him."

"Heh, so he has an army of knights running after him, too." Rita chortled, amused. "Just like the Imperial Knights were chasing after Estelle a while back!"

"The Knights chased Estelle because she's the princess," Yuri shot. He turned to Luke, whose face was downcast, silent. "If the Oracle Knights are after Luke, I want to know: why?"

An awkward silence filled the air. It was only a year ago, just after he had been appointed as captain of Alexei's Royal Guard that Luke had become aware of the Score read about him. Master Van had come to him, told him of the Score that foretold his birth, and how he was to somehow bring prosperity to the Empire with his power. Just as he had told Raven earlier that day, Luke had told Van he had no idea how he was going to do that, how such a responsibility had been hefted on his shoulders, one of four imperial heirs. His mentor had replied that when the time would come, he would tell Luke the rest of his Score, and help him in any way he could.

Feeling Yuri's steely gaze on him, Luke clenched his fists.

"I-I don't know the whole story myself. But … the Oracle Knights must want me because …" He squeezed his eyes shut, unable to go on. How had he suddenly become entangled in the center of everything? As the youngest heir to the throne he had never hoped for much, especially with his amnesia and headaches and hallucinations. Being in the Imperial Knights as Alexei's direct subordinate was all he could have hoped for.

"He's directly mentioned in the Score." Raven spoke for him. Luke didn't know whether or not to be grateful.

At that Karol nearly had a heart attack. "What?! No way! What did it say about him?! I had no idea he was so important!" It was bordering on the spaziness he usually reserved for the Don; Luke was so important that Daath's entire army, which sounded much larger than that of the Imperial Knights, chased after him! How cool was that?! Well, maybe not cool, but it just showed how much of a big deal it was!

"It said I was born with the power of Lorelei," Luke said, haltingly at first, but slowly gaining confidence in his words. "And that I'm supposed to bring prosperity to the Empire, though I'm not sure how." He glanced at Raven, who remained mercifully silent on the matter of the Seventh Fonon, and hyperresonance. Instead, the old man said,

"No kiddin'. Can't know how if the Score hasn't been read in the Empire for almost two decades."

"So we just have to make sure the Oracle Knights don't get to Luke." Yuri nodded. "It won't be easy, but it can be done …"

"But why would we keep Luke from him, if he's so important to the Score and the Oracle Knights have to make sure it comes true?" Estelle spoke up, stopping Yuri in his tracks as he made to continue onward. "It says he's supposed to bring prosperity to the Empire! How is that bad?"

"Yeah," Rita agreed, but not without a thoughtful expression. "If it promises prosperity, then I can't say the Empire has been doing all that well without it. Especially with nutcases like Ragou crawling about."

Annoyed, Yuri whirled around and retorted, "You wanna just hand Luke over to a bunch of soldiers that attacked us before? For a prophecy we don't even know the full extent of? What about Luke? What does_ he_ want?"

Startled, Luke looked up, his bright emerald eyes meeting Yuri's granite grey ones. Hadn't Yuri been angry with him since yesterday? After all that teasing, those snide remarks, that lecturing, he would stand up for him? All his life, Luke had done what was expected of him, at a furious pace—re-learning the basics of life, speaking and writing both the common language and Ancient Ispanian, the mannerisms of a noble, swordsmanship … hardly had anyone stopped and asked Luke his input, what he had sincerely wanted for himself in a decision that _mattered. _If it wasn't fulfilling what his family and peers expected of him, it was following Alexei's orders. Orders, orders, always orders. Nobody had ever asked what Luke thought. Until Yuri Lowell.

His voice wavered. "I … I don't know. I know I'm supposed to bring prosperity, but I haven't the faintest idea how. But I definitely don't want to be alone with all those Oracle Knights." It wasn't that he didn't trust Master Van, he just didn't trust Asch. And why should he? Asch had attacked him unprovoked.

"So what is it you're gonna do?" Yuri pressed, but not ungently. Estelle looked at him, and instantly realized that what he was doing for Luke now was just like what he had done for her. Took someone who had been living the life others had chosen for him without question, and Yuri was helping him to make his own decisions. Though Luke had not lived like Estelle had, he had been trapped within the Empire all the same.

"I'm … going to keep protecting Estelle. No matter the circumstance. No matter the cost."

With that, Yuri simply nodded, without calling Luke's words into question. And that made Luke's heart soar. He wasn't going to force Luke to do anything he didn't want to do, not like the noble had been forced to learn Ancient Ispanian, not like he had been forced to learn swordplay, not like he had been forced into the Knights. He wasn't ungrateful for the life he had, but it had always been up to others to determine his fate.

"Now that that's settled, we can keep moving. Hopefully Regaey hasn't disappeared on us by now."

As they moved onward, Luke continued with a spring in his step.

-

Fortunately, Regaey hadn't had the chance to pull a disappearing act like he had in Nordopolica. The way into the Malkuthian mining town of Akzeriuth was through a cavern called the Weasand of Cados. No sooner had they stepped inside the cool, refreshing shade than Repede immediately darted to a small recess, flushing the small, stuttering man out of hiding. Yuri gave a mirthless chortle. Raven had made a remark as they had torn off after the thief out of Nordopolica: guilds didn't take kindly to backstabbing idiots.

"Looks like he was hiding, hoping we'd just pass him by." He said, drawing his sword. Behind him, the others effectively blocked out the cavern mouth, and the sunlight along with it, casting even darker shadows over Regaey.

"P-p-please," The leader of Ruins' Gate stammered, looking alternatively between Yuri and his group and the dog clutching a dagger between its teeth in front of him, "i-i-if y-you would j-just—"

"What did you hope to gain by setting us up at the coliseum back there?" Yuri cut him off, casually shouldering his sword but still maintaining a threatening presence. Beside him, Rita clutched her whip, looking just as ready to lash the man as to cast magic.

"And give back that case! That isn't yours!"

The guildmaster looked so pathetic and frail that Yuri supposed he ought to have felt badly for taking arms against him, but Regaey wasn't leaving him with much choice. Inwardly he was glad to have a reason for wanting to beat the crap out of him when Regaey slowly took a step back, ever wary of Repede's growling.

"Y-you leave m-me no choice!"

No sooner were the words out of his mouth than four tall men cloaked in black dropped from the ceiling as if they had been hanging there like bats. Cruel daggers were fitted to their wrists without them actually holding the blades, and under their hoods their eyes glowed an unnatural red.

"Leviathan's Claw?!" Estelle took a step back, even though Yuri, Rita, Repede, and Raven stood between her and the eerie assassins. She felt a hand on her shoulder, and she looked back to see Luke, an assuring smile on his face. She remembered his promise not twenty minutes before they'd entered the cave. That he would protect her, no matter the cost.

Though the cavern's path was wide, it was not quite wide enough for a dozen people to fight. They had to bottleneck it, Repede, Yuri, Judith and Karol in the front, Rita, Raven, and Estelle providing support from the rear. Luke, true to his word, kept an eye out for attacks aimed at Estelle, who was literally the pillar that kept them standing. One of the Claw assassins had a crossbow that he aimed at the ranged fighters every so often; Luke deflected the bolts with his shield, even his sword if another one came too quickly.

Maybe they felt they had the upper hand by trapping Regaey in the cavern, cutting him off the exit, but never did they think anything of it, concentrating on the enemy before them. With only Luke to defend Estelle, Rita, and Raven, they had left themselves appallingly open to attacks from behind. Belatedly the knight captain realized that when three more shadows fell over him.

"Estelle! Look out!" Luke shoved her out of harm's way, just barely managing to hold his shield up in time. But the other two assassins, left with a clear shot at Rita and Raven, charged without hesitation. Cursing, the redhead threw his attacker off, daggers clashing with his sword as the red eyes met him blow for blow.

This time Raven's transform bow was useful; he folded it and slashed one of the assassins in the arm, kicked him aside. Rita, however, was not so lucky. She screeched a long string of foul curses, deep red staining her side even though her shirt was the same color. Estelle wedged herself between the assassin and her friend, fending well if only for her shield. Despite the princess's efforts in training with a sword, without her shield, she wouldn't have lasted long. Yuri and the others were busy fighting the first four Claw guildsmen in the front, but they were no less aware of the pincer attack than the ones who had actually suffered it.

Damn it! Luke was becoming increasingly careless with his parries and strikes, so eager was he to get this Claw assassin out of the way so he could help out Rita, Raven, and Estelle. Though the mage was injured, her royal friend was too busy fighting the one who had attacked her to heal her hurts, and Raven was doing an admirable job with his opponent as well, but for all the uses of a transform bow, it couldn't hold up for long against pure steel.

If only they hadn't been so confident that Regaey would have been by himself, a fragile man with no way to defend himself. If only they hadn't broken their usual formation rather like a herd of mustangs, all the stallions arrayed in a circle in order to protect the mares and foals. Instead of protecting the ranged support, they had been vulnerable, and now they paid the price.

The assassin kicked up dust into Luke's face; the knight faltered, coughing, trying to blink through the partial blindness. There was no way he could fight like this, and the assassin took full advantage of it. Like poor Rita not ten seconds earlier, Luke felt the plunge of a dagger pierce through his side, though he had managed at least to move aside enough that it merely sliced his side open, not pierced. The red eyes grabbed Luke's sword arm in an impossibly strong grip, raising his free arm, the sunlight behind them glinting malevolently off the curved dagger in the air.

Another blade _whooshed _though the air, and the assassin before Luke howled in pain, sinking to the stone floor, dark blood seeping under his body. Luke stared slack-jawed, so shocked was he that it took his own hot blood dripping onto his boot before he remembered he was injured. He pressed part of his cape against the gash, getting out of the way as his rescuer rushed the other three assassins. By himself the man couldn't take on all three, but the new attacks caught the assassins off guard, and allowed Estelle to step back to heal Rita, Raven to lay on the smackdown as he was meant to at range, and for Rita to finish them off with a particularly furious spell after Estelle healed her.

"Damn, Luke, you just get into all sorts of trouble without me, don't you?"

Though it was probably meant to be a reprimand, Luke knew that it never could be, not when it came from _him. _The knight smiled, even chuckled despite the fact his side had been ripped open and his blood was seeping through his fingers. With her supernatural ability of detecting injuries within a five mile radius, Estelle showered her golden light over Luke, and the pain vanished. He got to his feet, sword and shield in hand, but relaxed—Yuri and the rest had just cut down the last of the Leviathan's Claw ambushers.

"Master was right," Luke said to his friend with a chortle, "you really are a mother hen." Really, if he had come halfway across the world just to find the redhead … why, he could put the Lady Fabre to shame!

"And rightly so," Luke's servant and friend retorted, but not unkindly. "Hardly a few months go by before you're suddenly being attacked by assassins, in the middle of a cave, and away from the rest of the Guard you're supposed to be leading!"

"Yeah, well, stuff happened."

While Luke was happily chatting, everyone else had frozen where they stood, eyes stuck to their rescuer and jaws slack. Well, maybe not everyone—Karol and Rita were casting bewildered glances at the ones who were standing slackjawed staring like idiots. Namely Yuri, Estelle, and Raven. The old man's expression was a bit different than the ones the other two had, though no one could quite place it. It was Yuri and Estelle who looked as if they were on the verge of a heart attack.

" … Flynn?" Yuri said uncertainly at last. It was so crazy it just had to be true. The young man that had come and saved them from the Leviathan's Claw pincer attack was tall, like Flynn. He had short platinum blond hair, like Flynn, fair skin kissed olive by the sun, like Flynn, and had the most astoundingly blue eyes, like Flynn. He even fussed over Luke like Flynn would have over Yuri.

The only thing wrong with his assumption was that this blond man standing before him was wearing civilian clothing—an orange collared vest, a white shirt underneath that, black pants, a green belt, and boots up to his knee bordered in gold, with elbow length gloves to match. And though he wasn't surprised to see a sword belted to the man's waist, it wasn't like Flynn's broadsword at all, its blade was much thinner, rather like Yuri's sword. Besides, he didn't have a shield.

The blond man blinked, confused. "Flynn?" Beside him, Luke burst into a fit of laughter.

"Wow, I didn't notice it before, but you really do look just like Flynn." The redhead said at last when his giggling had subsided. "Everyone, this is my friend Guy. He used to serve my family in the manor back at Zaphias."

"Yo!" Guy waved at the others. Though he really wondered what Luke was doing out here without any of the Royal Guard in attendance, he was inwardly glad the young noble had managed to find some friends outside of the Imperial Knights after all. And even if they weren't from the Guard, at least Luke wasn't out here by himself. He gave a sheepish grin at Luke's introduction. "Well, technically I still do serve your family."

"Speaking of which," Luke replied as Yuri and Estelle were evidently getting over the shock of Flynn apparently having a secret twin, "weren't you serving Natalia?"

Guy's smile diminished some at the thought. It wasn't as if Natalia was a terrible mistress, far from it. It was just harder than it should have been, because of his little … condition … and he had entered Princess Natalia's service because after Luke had formally joined the Imperial Knights a year ago, there was no need for a civilian to keep playing guardian to the one whose job was to protect the imperial family.

"Yeah," he nodded, "and I still am. She sent me to come find you, Luke."

Luke quirked a brow. "Why?" Then he grew red in the face, recalling the events at the coliseum earlier that day. It had been almost three weeks since they had left Dahngrest after Phaeroh had attacked it, of course Natalia would have had word of his "kidnapping." Then it was Guy's turn to laugh.

"Isn't it obvious? She's worried about you."

"Natalia?" Estelle interjected, her curiosity getting the better of her. "As in Her Highness Princess Natalia, daughter of the emperor before last?"

"Another princess?" Rita demanded. Clearly she had been out of the loop on this one. Well, that was what she got for turning her entire world into blastia instead of, well, the world. "Just how many imperial heirs are there? Any more princes or princesses I should know about?"

"Well, actually," Guy began, "Luke is pretty much a prince in his own right."

"Gah! You imperials are impossible!" Rita yelled, holding her head as if it might explode.

"Shame on you, then, Rita," Karol said with a sly grin, "as an imperial citizen you should know these things!" He was quickly silenced with a well placed smack upside the head.

"Well, it can't be all that surprising that they were kept secret then," Raven added with a shrug, "what with all the nobles grabbing for power. That might be why the throne's been empty fer so long; they're still trying to decide who's to take it."

"Okay, that's enough!" Luke nearly shouted, and all eyes turned to him, surprised. Rarely did Luke take the stand; he only had ever done so among his knights, as they were his men to command, and loyal to him without question. "We can talk about all this later; right now we have to catch up to Regaey and take back that crystal!"

"I wouldn't worry too much about it," Yuri replied, though he turned to lead the way into the deep cavern nonetheless. "There's a chance he might not even get into the city up ahead."

What with the way the city and its quarries were carved into the very mountains, it came as no surprise that the people of Akzeriuth used these caverns as underground roads of sorts. Many times they passed by intersections that led into other passages lined with walls and buildings, and they even saw soldiers wearing Malkuth's aqua blue mantle. The guards thus far hadn't tried to stop them, they were still on the road, after all.

But something was weird. If this was supposed to be a mining city, where were all the people? Sure there were the Malkuth guards, but they were just guards standing vigil. They didn't see very many townsfolk, and they were mostly miners. Well, these mountains were huge and held rich deposits; of course the ore must flow. Still, the lack of activity—though after Nordopolica didn't everything seem to lack activity in comparison?—only seemed to point out that something was wrong, and since Akzeriuth was carved right in the middle of the mountains, they were walking headlong into it.

And so had Regaey, Yuri noted with satisfaction. Despite Ruins' Gate apparently being connected with Leviathan's Claw, or being the victim of blackmail from the latter guild, the stuttering archaeologist couldn't have come with any more assassins than he had revealed in the entrance, and even if he did and they were somehow shadowing him, ready to attack at a moment's notice, Yuri's group was more than prepared to defend itself and deal back in spades. Luke's friend and servant Guy's addition into their fold benefited them greatly as well.

Up ahead, there seemed to be a makeshift checkpoint of sorts, their path sloping downward, and blocked by a knot of Malkuth soldiers. Before them was none other than Regaey, who preciously clutched the box he had stolen to his chest, as if it were his only child. The caves carried sound fairly well, they didn't need to be directly behind Regaey to hear him pleading pathetically to the Malkuth soldiers.

"P-p-please, it is extremely im-important that I g-get through!"

Even through the helmet on his face, the Malkuth soldier seemed to don an expression of pity for the husk of a man in front of him. He held his halberd out beside his comrade, who did much the same. "I'm sorry sir, but there's a serious problem in Akzeriuth and until measures are made against it, none can pass."

Yuri's group slowed to a halt just a stone' s throw away from Regaey's back, who was still weakly protesting. "What kind of problems?" the knight drop out called to the soldiers, and Regaey whirled around, practically screeching his fear. Yuri's eyes fell with a small smirk to the leader of Ruins' Gate, the man would get what was coming to him. The soldier to the left looked up to acknowledge this new band of travelers as they approached, pinning Regaey between them.

"Nobody really knows for sure," the soldier admitted, managing to look puzzled although none could see his face for his helmet. "In one of the deeper mine shafts a poisonous fog began seeping up. Eventually it began trickling even in the residential areas, so most of the miners and their families are living in the quarries for the time being."

"The quarries?" Estelle asked, hand held up to her face as she gaped, appalled. "That's no place for people to live! Why couldn't they leave the city?"

The soldier shuffled nervously. "Well, Nordopolica 's a tourist city, they wouldn't have the room for so many refugees. And on the other side is Mantaic, an Imperial town. The neutral trading city of Chesedonia lies beyond that, but across the Sands of Kogohr. For now, the citizens are trapped."

"But," Estelle refused to back down, stubborn for the well being of others. For a healer, no one truly expected any less. "Surely they can take ships to another Malkuth city!" It wasn't as if Nordopolica were strictly a guild city, there were people from the empire there, too, and surely from Malkuth. Daathics such as the Oracle Knights hadn't had a problem being there, either.

"Unfortunately, they can't." The soldier replied, and he sounded truly sorry. "Most of Nordopolica's ships are little more than holding pens for the monsters they use in their tournaments. The few ships that are for human passengers wouldn't be enough. Only a handful of people could be moved to another city that way, leaving the others to the miasma. So they refused to leave their friends and family."

That shocked Estelle into silence. "B-but …" Rita stepped forward, with an evil glance at Regaey, who did little more than cower at his predicament.

"Okay, I get that they can't leave, but you did send word to your king, right?"

"Word has been sent to His Majesty Emperor Peony IX," The soldier replied stiffly. Rita shook her head impatiently.

"Emperor, whatever. What you should be asking, what is this miasma? Do you have any mages that studied it?"

The soldier laughed at the word 'mages,' turning Rita red in the face. "Mages? Good heavens, no. The Malkuth Empire has only employed fonists for over a thousand years."

"But did you find out what this miasma was?" Yuri interjected before Rita could go off on an angry rant at the soldier. Jeez, if this was how things were, with Malkuth rejecting blastia and the mages that built and operated them, no wonder they split away from the original Empire so many years ago! At his question, the soldier shook his head sadly.

"I'm afraid not. All we know is that it's coming from deep underground, and while it won't kill you right away, it will if you inhale enough of it over an extended period of time." From the sudden change in his demeanor, it appeared he thought the people of Akzeriuth were doomed. "The Emperor will surely consort with Daath on how to solve this problem. Score grant us mercy,"

Yuri bit his tongue, resisting the violent urge to call out that act of lunacy on Malkuth's part. An entire city was in grave danger; instead of relying on a theocracy that surely was using this Score prophecy as leverage to maintain control over them, their Emperor needed to get these people out of here! If he turned to Zaphias and asked them for help, then surely … he closed his eyes, clenching a fist. He couldn't see the nobles wanting anything to do with a city that was no longer theirs. But Alexei, the Imperial Knights … they might. He had to trust in the parts of the Knights that weren't snivelling idiots like Cumore; like Flynn and the Commandant himself.

"Okay, so there isn't anything you can do for those people at the moment," Yuri conceded, and the soldier before him nodded gravely. "But, you can do something about this!" He pointed to Regaey, who still quavered in his boots. "That's the leader of the guild Ruins' Gate; we have reason to believe his guild's been dealing in illegal weaponry blastia."

"And he stole that case from us!" Rita piped up, forgiving the soldier, at least momentarily, for his scoff about mages. He didn't appear to hold any love for blastia, either.

"What do we care what you guilds and such do with blastia? Our country has stopped relying on such an unstable technology centuries ago."

"You should care," Luke spoke up from his position behind Estelle. "Because if this goes on, who's to say those who obtain such blastia won't use them against you and this city?"

That shut the soldier up. He nodded to his comrade, and they moved toward Regaey. "If that's so, then we should apprehend him and turn him over to Dahngrest."

Raven clapped his hands excitedly. "Hooray, that's the second guild master we managed to knock down within two months!"

"Watch your mouth, old man," Yuri said as he caught the red case the Malkuth soldiers tossed to him, "the Don might think you have some ambitions of your own." Gently he shook the case. It was still locked, and still contained the mysterious clear ciel crystal. He looked up, puzzled, as Regaey was giving a creepy, nervous laugh even as the Malkuth soldiers apprehended him.

"F-fine, take th-that thing, b-but this do-doesn't end here!" There was a flash of light, the sound of swords swiping through the air and striking armor. When the light subsided, the two Malkuth guards lay on the stone floor, ripped apart with grevious wounds. Standing over their bodies weren't the red eyed assassins, but the two young women that had helped Yeager escape in Heliord.

"Hey! It's those hussies from before!" Rita shouted angrily, a blastia formula drawing itself under her.

"Well, well," Yuri said as Gauche and Droite yanked their blades from the bodies of the men they had just murdered, "so Regaey was Yeager all along?" He looked past the young women, and sure enough, instead of the quavering master of the archaeologist's guild stood Yeager, a massive scythe over his shoulder.

"Ja, ja, you figured it out easy enough. I'll let you keep that case, because I sure don't want to end up like poor Ragou, oh no."

"Ragou?" Luke demanded. "Do you know where that rat ran off to?" For the corrupt magistrate had gone mysteriously missing after the Imperial Knights had apprehended and released him in Dahngrest weeks ago.

Yeager laughed, a horrible sound that rebounded off the cave walls. "Zat poor bastard never had ze chance to run. Zey found his body in the river no more zan an hour's walk from Dahngrest!"

"Ragou is … dead?" Estelle asked quietly, shocked.

But Yeager said no more, he gave a mocking two-fingered salute as a goodbye and his female lackies tossed down a smoke bomb as they had in Heliord. Even when Raven cleared the fog with his Wind Blade magic arte, all three of Leviathan's Claw had vanished. The archer groaned, looking truly sorry at having missed another chance to fight the Claw's master.

"Now what?" Karol asked, and for once the boy could hardly be blamed for sounding frightened. They had their clear ciel crystal back, but … "Shouldn't we let someone in this city know Leviathan's Claw just killed two of their soldiers?" He didn't ask, but the question was on everyone's mind anyway: should they do anything with the soldiers' bodies?

"From the sound of it," Yuri said carefully after a moment's pause, "it doesn't seem like many people will be in the city. They're all in the quarries. We don't know how to get there."

"It isn't right, these soldiers were innocent," Estelle bowed her head, her eyes fixed on the gaping holes in the men's backs. Undoubtedly she wanted nothing more than to use her power to heal them, but though she could fix the wounds, the damage had already been done. Nothing could bring these men back. Gauche and Droite hardly looked any older than the princess herself, and yet they killed without so much as batting an eyelash. She was about ready to cry. "We can't just leave them here!"

"Actually, that's the best thing we can do for them." Luke said, and all eyes turned to him, wide with shock. He ignored their expressions, though he was obviously unsettled by it. Of course it sounded like he was saying they should go on as if nothing had happened. He cleared his throat. "There are still the bodies of those assassins we fought earlier. If another patrol comes around, someone will find them and the ones here. It doesn't take an idiot to put two and two together."

"That won't do much for Dahngrest's relations with Malkuth," Raven said mournfully. He sighed. "But it _was _a guild that killed them. Better the truth than they think the Empire did it."

Better the truth, everyone agreed on that, but it didn't make it any easier to swallow. The poor soldiers had only been doing their jobs. And yet, if it was one thing Luke could understand, soldier to soldier, it was that those men had understood what it meant to be in the army: laying down one's life for a greater cause, for the protection of their country, of their people. Wasn't that why Luke had been put into the Imperial Knights? Not only to get him out of the running for the throne, but also to protect the people of the Empire, not just the royalty?

And yet the Imperial Knights as a whole hadn't seemed to be doing a proper job of that. Though the Knights hadn't been allowed jurisdiction over that situation, Ragou had been allowed to isolate and torment the people he was supposed to be watching over. Captain Cumore had abused his position to take advantage of the people to further his own petty schemes. No doubt the Commandant would have dealt with Cumore if the slippery bastard hadn't escaped courtesy of Yeager.

Yuri led the way forward, into the darkness of the tunnel beyond. "Just be careful of this miasma the soldier mentioned." Tragedy or not, Brave Vesperia had a job to do. They had to get through this underground road, the Weasand of Cados, to get to the Sands of Koghor.

"How can we be careful of it if it's a fog that's contaminated the entire mountain!?" Rita grumbled but she moved forward.

They kept their formation from earlier: the ranged in the middle, Yuri, Karol, Repede, and Judith in the front, Luke and Guy protecting the rear. The lower quarter orphan kept occasionally stealing glances over his shoulder at theblond swordsman beside the Royal Guard captain. It was so unreal, he could have sworn it really was Flynn, except Flynn would never abandon his knights, or go anywhere without his armor unless he was off duty. And with the state of the Empire, the only way Flynn was going to have a vacation was if he were booted from the Knights.

And it was infinitely stranger to see one who looked almost exactly like Flynn treat anyone else but Yuri as a friend. And not just as a friend, someone's best friend. As he heard Luke speak to Guy in a hushed voice (no doubt recounting all his adventures to his former servant and guardian), he felt an odd pang. It wasn't jealousy, after all Yuri didn't even know the first thing about Guy, but rather he was … missing having Flynn around. The days where they had lived in the lower quarter were harsh, tough, as street rats that fought for their survival day in and out, but they had had each other to stay afloat.

It was true, Yuri had made new friends: Estelle, Karol, Judith, even Rita and Raven, and Luke to some extent. But none of them had grown up with him, none of them had that closeness and mutual understanding. None of them could beat him in everything they did together, none of them could tell him to "catch up" to them like it was a challenge. Yuri realized he did miss his best friend, but the way he was going … he also knew that they might not remain friends for long.

Guy listened to Luke's recount of everything that had happened to him ever since Lady Estellise had gone missing. He had first assumed that all the people he found Luke with were his friends. He was half right. Luke got along well enough with Karol, Rita, Lady Estellise, Judith, and even Raven, the surly guildsman was full of questionables. But Guy frowned as he learned that Luke and Yuri were almost always clashing, whether Yuri was enabling Lady Estellise to postpone returning to the capital or telling him how to do his job.

Then Guy's throat hitched when Luke told him how not two hours earlier before they entered the Weasand of Cados, Yuri had done something for Luke no one had all his life: Yuri had asked Luke what _he _had wanted. Guy knew better than anyone that all Luke's life, the redhead had no choice, he was to do what he was told, and do it well. Back home in Zaphias Guy had been the one to comfort Luke when he was driven well beyond his breaking point. Though he had also been the one to tell his charge to pick up the slack, because he had a job to do. But he didn't do that today when Luke's steps lagged behind the others' somewhat.

Ever since Luke had returned from his kidnapping, everything was happening much too fast.


	7. I'm Not the One You Should be Asking

A/N: So yeah, I'm gonna try working on this story, Flight of the Phoenix (now that I remembered what I was doing with it) along with Dimensional Rift, too since they're all good stories with awesome supporters. It's gonna take a while, but as long as I don't lose all the synopses this time ...

--

Even with the shining lamps attached to the hewn stone walls that illuminated the cavern, it was difficult for anyone to see anything more than a hand before their face. With the warning of the late soldier from earlier in mind, they didn't know what this miasma looked like, and only knew they had come into its midst when someone began coughing. Yuri knew the last thing they needed was to stop, especially in the middle of a toxic fog they couldn't even see.

"C'mon guys, keep moving, we need to get through this cave."

"Wait."

Yuri turned around to see Rita bathed in a crimson glow; she had conjured a sphere of aer, like fire but closer to light so that they had more than the dim lanterns to see. He was surpised the mage would try such an arte right after they'd got the clear ciel crystal back, the object that had made Rita lose control of her magic in the first place. Though it took some amount of concentration to keep her magical flare intact, it was by no means a powerful attack spell like the one that had backfired so disastrously in Nordopolica. Rita's eyes scanned their surroundings, much easier to see now that they had some real light.

They stood on a stone bridge, carved to span the endless chasm of darkness on either side below. Swirling up from those depths, deep and dark red at the base and ranging to a reddish violet as it rose was a strange smoky substance. It engulfed their feet up to their ankles, and had an acrid stench that made those who hadn't succumbed to coughing at least gag. So this was what the miasma looked like.

"Man," Karol managed between coughs, "that soldier wasn't kidding when he said this was serious. I'm getting dizzy just from standing here."

Yuri rolled his eyes at Rita. "Then all the more reason we should move on, right?"

"This doesn't look familiar at all to you guys?" Rita pressed, waving an arm to indicate the toxic fog swirling around their feet. Behind her Estelle attempted to quell everyone's coughing spasms with Recover and First Aid. The healing artes helped soothe the symptoms, but their chests burned and felt as if they were about to be torn apart from the inside.

"And why would it look familiar?" Luke asked, somewhat irritated. Like Karol he was swaying on his feet, a hand pressed to his chest as he tried not to take gulping breaths of the poisonous fog. Guy held out an arm to help steady his friend, but he wasn't looking so hot either. Rita clicked her tongue impatiently.

"Because this is an aer krene."

Waves of shock sloshed through everyone present.

"This is an aer krene?!" Karol demanded, raising his voice even though it only made him cough more. "It doesn't look anything like Keiv Moc!"

"Keiv Moc, mieu?" Came a squeak from Luke's bag. Karol nodded, then he realized where the sound came from. Giving a frightened squeak himself, he pointed a shaking finger at Luke's bag, from which emerged a fluffly blue and white rabbit creature, except this creature had a golden ring about its waist, and it was talking. Talking. All eyes turned curiously to Luke.

The Imperial Knight heaved a sigh. "It's a long story. Get back in the bag, Mieu, it isn't safe out here."

"Aw, he's soooo cute!" Estelle breathed, looking as if she wanted nothing more than to squeeze the thing to death. Luke passed Mieu over to her, where he was promptly cuddled until the knight captain added the cheagle should stay in Karol's bag as there was more room in there. The boss of the budding Brave Vesperia guild reluctantly agreed, and the blue ball of fur vanished from sight.

"Anyway," Rita continued, "most of us encountered instances where we were exposed to too much aer, and we felt adverse effects. But that had been _pure _aer. Being aersick is no fun, but the worst it would do is stunt kids' growth and rend us unconscious. Aer shouldn't be poisonous to the point it's killing people by itself!"

After a few moments of thought, Guy spoke, the first time he really spoke to anyone but Luke after he was introduced a short while ago. "You said pure aer. Is there anything doing something to the aer here to make it poisonous?"

Rita clenched her free hand into a fist, thinking. All the places that suffered overdoses of aer put forth by the aer krene hadn't been that way for long, although abnormalities occurred like monsters driven crazy and plants becoming overgrown to the point they destroyed parts of buildings. What … happened if too much aer were exposed for a long period of time? Not days or weeks, but months? Years? Did aer get so toxic over time that eventually it became this miasma the people of Akzeriuth were helpless against? She shook her head.

"I-I can't think of anything it can be mixing with, but something definitely changed the aer. I'm wondering though, is this what happens if enough aer comes to the surface after a significant period of time?"

"You can't think of anything it can be mixing with?" Raven said, and as he did, Luke's jaw clenched tightly. "Anything at all?"

"Well, aer is the raw ingredient that helps make up matter, but when put with abiotic matter there's practically no change! It's only in living matter that things change, and only in the living things themselves." Rita's frustration was increasingly becoming more apparent with the edge of rage in her voice. Nothing before had escaped her brilliant mind, nothing! So why couldn't she figure out this damn aer krene?!

"Besides," she growled, eyes still fixed on the swirling fog, "what would you know about it, old man?"

"I might not know for sure, but I can sure as hell guess." He replied with a half smile. The separation of the Empires and now Daath's excommunication … or had it been truly an excommunication on Daath's part? Perhaps the Empire had simply renounced Daath and anything it advocated, whether it was the Score, or the other subatomic particle that helped make up matter.

"So what's your guess? I'd _love _to hear the professional opinon of a non-mage."

"Well, you're certainly not getting anywhere." The cry of pain following Karol's statement must have echoed in the caverns for miles. With a cough the boy whined, "Sheesh, Rita, you don't have to hit me all the time!" He ducked when the mage raised her hand again, though she did not strike.

"Aer isn't the only thing that can make up matter." Raven said, meeting Rita's incredulous stare with an unfaltering one of his own. "There's another type of particle, particles that have their own vibration frequency: fonons." He paused for dramatic effect, but instead of looking at him with awe and respect, the others save Judith and Luke gazed at him as if he had grown another head. The archer scowled. "There are different kinds of fonons, named for the effects they induce as well as being a part of matter. First for darkness, Second for earth, Third for wind, Fourth for water, Fifth for fire, and Sixth for light, et cetera …"

Rita scoffed, her cheeks puffed up as if she were about to burst in laughter. "Are you kidding, old man? None of the imperial mages ever reported discovering a 'fonon'! And even if that were true, how could vibrating particles change aer into something else?"

Raven's shoulders slumped down, and he heaved a disappointed sigh. "Fer a mage, you're pretty narrow minded …"

"I don't think he's lying," Guy said, arms folded over his chest. He backed up a few steps when Rita's killer stare turned on him, and who could blame him? With a quavering in his voice to rival Karol's, the blond swordsman stuttered, "W-well, I mean, wouldn't that what those guards back there meant when he said Malkuth used fonists instead of mages?"

At that Rita's bewildered expression calmed somewhat. "Oh yeah. I completely forgot because that was when Yeager called his floozies. Fonists, huh? And he did say Malkuth hasn't used blastia for centuries … I didn't think there was another way of having technology without blastia …" She cleared her throat, trying to avoid coughing although the miasma-aer swirling around them made it difficult.

"Rita," Estelle began, beginning to shake as she had when aer had overflowed Caer Bocram, "we can think about this later, right? I-I don't feel so good …" It was almost double the agony; instead of just too much aer, there was also its altered form, so dubbed the miasma. After what seemed like an eternity of considering, Rita nodded.

"Yeah. We can talk about this later." She turned, and took no more than three steps when the earth underfoot rumbled. It was a small tremor at first, then steadily grew in size and power until the nine of them had to hold on to one another to avoid falling over into the chasm below. In the quaking, Rita's aery light guttered and went out, throwing the cave into absolute darkness.

"What the—" Yuri whirled around, hearing the beating of wings. But instead of quick and short, like a small bat or bird, they were slow, gradual. _Whoosh. Whoosh. _Slow wingbeats meant something much, much, larger than a bat or bird. Slowly the aer around them seeped upward, swallowing their legs, making way toward their waists. Searing pain flared in every nerve of Yuri's body, and he groped on the ground blindly, trying to find his way out of the aer krene, pushing the others back.

As the volume of aer grew, so did the amount of its own light it emitted, throwing an eerie crimson glow on everything and everyone. Yuri's eyes widened at the sheer amount of aer had begun to overflow from the krene. If they didn't get out soon, they'd be swallowed by it, and though Rita had said pure aer wasn't enough to kill a person, there was the miasma to consider, and whatever permanent damage they might incur if they stayed submerged in it.

"Go, go, go!" Yuri yelled, trying not to choke on the poisonous fog, a dark violet mixing with the red aer. Everyone stumbled back as the earth continued to shake, and fervently Yuri remembered that as the site of a mining city, these mountains were undoubtedly carved with more tunnels. Even that Malkuth soldier had said this miasma had begun to seep from a deep mining shaft, right below the aer krene. With the earth shaking like this, it was only far too easy to imagine that some of those tunnels might collapse …

"What the hell is that?!" Guy yelled, and as he did, those who weren't looking in the same direction he did turned their heads. Those slow wingbeats echoed in their ears, and if most of them hadn't already seen Phaeroh, they might have just fainted from fear. A huge feathered dragon with fearsome talons hovered above them, a deep crimson light cumulating in its beak.

At first Yuri had thought it was going to attack, but then he noticed something. The volume of aer … was shrinking. He stared bewildered at the dragon, what he was tempted to call monster, but remembering Phaeroh and the way Judith had looked at him, whatever the dragon was, was of the same ilk. He stole a glance at the Krityan, and she indeed gazed upon the dragon as she had Phaeroh. But still—what was the dragon doing? Rita voiced his answer in a strangled voice, and not just because of the miasma.

"It's—_eating _the aer!"

Then, as soon as it had come, the dragon was gone. It was only after everyone had begun to stand on shaking feet that they also realized the earth was no longer shaking. Their section of the cavern seemed intact, but there was no telling if a tunnel had collapsed farther ahead. Rita scowled at the pit of the aer krene that no longer gushed aer.

"Damn, that was the same thing that guy did with his sword at Keiv Moc …" She reluctantly turned away from the gaping pit of the aer krene, feeling the eyes of her companions boring holes in the back of her head. The aer krene itself wasn't going anywhere, and though she wanted to study it, she didn't feel as if there was much more to discover. Like that man Duke had said, aer krene were simply fountains of aer. But, wait … she carefully inhaled, and nothing constricted her lungs as it had merely moments before.

"Hey … the miasma's gone, too." It was little more than a whisper, but the others had heard, and experimentally breathed in response. Karol took in too deep of a breath and doubled over coughing. Rita's face fell, the dragon had eaten clouds of miasma, but only whatever amount had been caught up in the aer it vaccuumed. Slowly, the stench of the toxic fog was coming back.

"Let's get moving." Yuri broke the tentative silence. "If the miasma's not all gone, then we shouldn't stay."

"Hmph," Rita folded her arms, her walk almost something like a strut. "If the miasma's coming from the same place as the aer krene, or if it is altered aer, then shame on Malkuth for not having mages to study it." It was ironic that the country that turned its back on the study of aer in favor of these things called fonons would have one of their own cities endangered by it.

-

Though they had left the aer krene behind more than an hour earlier, the events still had Luke's mind reeling. He agreed with Guy, that something changed the aer in this particular krene. He didn't know what kinds of effects fonons had on aer, if at all. While it was true he used fonons to alter his strike artes as Master Van had taught him, he never really used fonons together with aer to intentionally change one or the other. Mages using blastia used fonons in their artes, too, but only because the fonons got caught up in the flow of aer; blastia didn't do anything to fonons. The fonons were merely being displaced from one area to another.

As they walked, Luke was left to wonder: what would happen if a fonist worked with fonons to change the aer? It would depend what fonons, of course, but if Guy was right and that something other than aer changed it, and Raven right in that it was fonons that changed it, then, how? To what extent? For fonons and aer being primeval components of matter they mixed harmlessly enough. Luke rubbed his temple as he tried to think. He'd been right about one thing: he was no fonist, or a mage, either. It wouldn't do any good to keep dwelling on it. Sooner or later the genius mage would have it figured out.

Fortunately none of the tunnels had collapsed in that earlier quake, or at least the one they were using hadn't. Soon enough the cool cavern air had changed to searing heat, and impossibly strong sunlight glared into the cave's mouth. So ended the tunnel of the Weasand of Cados, opening the way to the Sands of Koghor.

"Mieuuu! It's so bright! And so warm!" Mieu popped his head from under the flap of Karol's bag, soaking its face in the afternoon sunlight. Tolbyccia had been a cooler continent, almost always raining, almost always full of mist. But no more than a few seconds in the desert sun than the cheagle shrank away from it, almost whining. "It's too warm, mieuuuu."

"No kidding," Rita replied, apparently uncaring that she was talking to a small rabbit creature that could speak itself. She cast a glance at Yuri, who was dressed in all dark clothing, with dark and even eyes to boot. She grinned. "Can you make it two minutes without getting fried?"

Yuri shrugged, maintaining a nonchalant exterior even when one looked closely they could see sweat beading on his brow already. "I'm all right. You should be more worried about the old man—" No sooner were the words out of his mouth than the very same old man had rushed past him, practically dancing in the golden sand and light outside of the damp and dark cave. He blinked. "Well, if not him, then Luke."

"Why me?" Luke asked, frowning in such a way that it could turn into a pout within half a moment.

"Oh, I dunno, just that your armor would make staying as cool as possible in a desert pretty hard."

The redhead's face fell as he realized that Yuri was absolutely right. He remembered how hot pieces of metal were to the touch after letting them soak in the sun, like the lamp poles in Zaphias or parts of the ramparts in Diedon Hold. He was wearing more metal than anyone else, sword and shield in addition to the armor plates. He groaned, glaring hard at the wide blue sky ahead, perfectly void of any giant flying talking birds.

"Phaeroh better be here. I am not getting broiled alive for nothing!"

"Yeah," Yuri said, stepping out fully into the sun, from the cool darkness and stone to hot sun and sand. Save for the rings in the air that clearly marked the oasis town of Mantaic a little aways from here, all he could see were endless dunes of sand, bordered in some places by rocky plateaus. "We've got a helluva area to cover."

"Hey, if Phaeroh came to see Estelle in Dahngrest," Karol spoke up, "maybe he'll come to see her if we've been wandering around his homeland long enough!"

"That would save us a great deal of time," Judith agreed with a small smile, though she knew none should be smiling. If Phaeroh did find them first, no doubt he would kill Estelle this time. She was worried about getting away from him alive, never mind finding any answers. But maybe, just maybe if she talked to him … her thoughts wandered, unfazed by the desert heat.

Guy stared at the vast expanse of desert before them, with only one town that dared to live on the edge of the Sands. He gave a low whistle of amazement. "You've been inviting all sorts of trouble lately, huh, Luke?" His former master groaned.

"Yeah, well, you're coming with me, aren't you?"

The blond swordsman laughed. "True enough."

"Anyway," Yuri said, drawing all eyes to him, "we need to rest and prepare for crossing the desert in town. Mantaic, was it?" He grinned, staring at the cluster of buildings with a turquoise halo that marked the barrier blastia. "Damn I'm glad it has a barrier."

-

Though Mantaic didn't look like much, it had the basic necessities: an inn (though it was one room with only six beds), places to cook (hooray for preserved food!), restrooms (indoor plumbing was without a doubt man's greatest invention, Geraios civilization or not), and a bath house. While Raven complained it wasn't nearly as good as the hot springs of Yumanju, wherever that was, it served well enough, and everyone, especially Judith, was grateful for a chance to wash up. It would be the last chance they had before heading out into the desert, unless they found another oasis, and even then it wouldn't be prudent to use that water for bathing.

The baths of Mantaic weren't natural hot springs. Instead, the people appropriated some water from the spring of their oasis and used a blastia to heat the water. The bathwater itself was precious as the people couldn't afford to keep refilling it use after use, so it was custom to wash first outside of the bath, then soak. The bath house could be used for at least four at a time, so it was suggested that the girls wash up first.

Judith was especially glad for the prospect of one last bath, as was Estelle, but Rita stubbornly stayed behind at the inn, preferring trying to work out the mysteries of the clear ciel crystal and its effect on magic, the aer krene, whether miasma was aer or something else, and whether she'd get the crystal to Yormgen, if it even existed anymore!

"Surely you'll think better after you clean up," Judith said over the mage's shoulder, a bar of soap in one hand and a towel draped over her arm. Rita waved her hand dismissively, glaring daggers in the innocent little red box that contained the clear ciel crystal.

"Nah, I don't need a bath. I can go for days without bathing."

The Krityan cringed at the thought. "Ohh, I'd be on my deathbed if I had to go so long without a bath."

Rita snorted in a half-laugh. "You're not a flower; I doubt you'll wilt over!"

But Judith still looked rather ill thinking of going so many days neglecting her personal hygiene. Karol, holding Mieu in his lap as the cheagle drank in the environment of the inn, smirked at the mage sitting across from him.

"I know! Judith's a flower, but Rita's a prickly cactus!"

Maybe it was because they were indoors, but Rita for once didn't toss a spell at whoever incurred her wrath. Not to say the one who had transgressed went without punishment of any sort. Her thick spellbook went flying across the room, hitting Karol squarely between the eyes. Crying out from surprise as much as pain, the founder of Brave Vesperia fell over backwards off the bed he was sitting on. The book fell open on the floor beside him, and Mieu looked at the pages.

"Mieuu, what's spon-tan-ee-us combus-shun?"

Rita gaped. "You … can read?" The cheagle hopped toward her.

"The cheagle elder taught us to see words, if that's what you mean."

"But—you're a woodland creature! How can you read?!"

The cheagle only made another of his trademark mieu noises in response, clearly not understanding why Rita was so shocked. After the day's gathering of food was done in the forest, the whole tribe would gather in the hollow of their tree and the elder would set about to teaching the young ones to see the words of humans and even to make them.

"Wow!" Karol beamed at Mieu even as he sat up, rubbing the bump on his head where the book had hit. "Not even the Hunting Blades knew there were monsters that talked and read! Nan will so flip out when she hears about this!"

"Phaeroh can talk," Yuri pointed out from his seat on the floor by Repede. The dog looked at the cheagle, not whether it could make a snack of the blue creature, but more like a tired babysitter would at an obnoxious child. Perhaps as animal to animal they could understand one another.

"Yeah but Judith says he's not a monster! And can Phaeroh read?! How come I'm the only one excited about this?!"

Judith chortled, taking her leave to head for the bath house. Estelle had gone on ahead earlier, surely no one loved a good bath more than the imperial princess. The Krityan had one last look for Rita as if to say this was her last chance in a long while to get a bath, but the mage continued to gape at the cheagle and paid her no mind. She shrugged; it was her loss. Prickly cactus indeed!

Yuri grinned as he surveyed the room. Judith and Estelle were gone, off to take the last good washes they'd have in a while. Rita and Karol still blathered over the blue cheagle, who didn't really understand the attention it was getting but seemed glad to making friends anyway. Luke's friend Guy was sitting on a bed jammed in a corner of the room, farthest away from … Yuri blinked. Farthest away from—the girls? Granted, the only girl in here at the moment was Rita, but Guy's staked spot was a respectful distance from the beds Judith and Estelle had claimed before going off to bathe. The blond swordsman was all ready for a long rest the night before their trek through the desert, his nose buried in a book about blastia.

The impromptu right hand man of Brave Vesperia scanned the room some more, realizing that two of their number were missing: old man archer Raven, and the captain of Alexei's Royal Guard. With a jolt Yuri recalled the number of Imperial Knights stationed throughout Mantaic, wearing the colors of the Cumore Brigade. Though their captain's actions in Heliord had sparked a fury within, he saw no actual wrong committed by those knights; they were just standing guard. He thought the town had seemed a bit subdued, but he had chalked it up to life in a dearly, hot desert. He looked about, a white shield with the crimson crest of the Royal Guard catching his eye at the foot of the bed next to Guy's.

Yuri quirked a brow. Odd. Why would Luke go anywhere without his shield?

-

The desert was surprisingly cool at night. Luke had never known that, standing by the oasis, staring long and hard at the giant barrier blastia submerged in the water. The pool reflected the rings of the barrier, diamond stars sprinkled on a velvety black tapestry. The waning moon, still mostly full, shone the brightest. Luke scowled at it, fists clenched at his sides. He didn't look about the town, he knew Cumore's knights were still there, standing guard, as it were. To him it looked more like they were suppressing the people here, keeping activity down. Bizarre as Cumore had done the opposite back in Heliord, using the knights to force people to work, but the fact remained it hadn't sat well with him.

But when he questioned one of the lieutenants about it …

"What's the matter?"

Luke spared a small glance over his shoulder. "Oh, it's you." In response, Raven made a long face. The archer cleared his throat.

"Well then, good evenin' to ya, too. My question still stands: what's up?"

Luke sat down on the bank of sand, leaning back against a palm tree. He glared daggers in his gauntlets, clearly upset. "Cumore's knights are here. I asked one of the lieutenants about it, but …" His hands closed into fists, shaking with the pressure. "They ignored me. I outrank the entire brigade as Alexei's elite captain, and they disobeyed a direct command!"

Raven quirked a brow, scratching his chin thoughtfully. "But, these knights didn't try to apprehend you or the princess? Since Yuri supposedly kidnapped you two? Ain't that weird?"

"I have no idea," Luke groaned, running his fingers through his bangs. Cumore had all but publicly declared his intention to eventually betray the Commandant in the Rising City; what use would he have for the princess and a Royal Guardsman? Plenty. Cumore could have arrested them and held them hostage for leverage in his soon to be onslaught against Alexei, but then again, the vain nobleman was probably too much of an idiot to realize it. But what got to Luke the most …

"The lieutenant … he said to me, 'a captain without men is no captain.' It's not like I wanted to be separated from my unit!"

Raven shrugged. "They're just idiots. But how many captains can boast being able to do their jobs without any of their men at all? Not many!"

That made Luke smile, even chuckle a little. There were a few moments of silence, the cool nocturnal breeze of Desier ruffling the surface of the oasis. "Hey, Raven."

"Hn?" Raven looked up from where he was examining his knife. Giving Luke his full attention he jammed it back in his belt. "Yeah?"

"You're a Seventh Fonist, aren't you?"

The archer fell silent. His mouth went dry, his tongue felt as if it were plastered to the roof of his mouth. A nervous chortle emanated from his sandpapery throat. "Heh, what gives you that idea?"

Without even looking up at him, Luke's lips parted.

_Toue lei ze, kuroa ryou toue ze …_

Raven froze as the song reached his ears. It wasn't as good as it could be, and the lyrics held no power in themselves, but he still stood rooted in place when he heard them. He'd known he had grown increasingly careless over the years, but to let _that _slip--!

There was no denying it. He laughed, a raspy chuckle. "Hah, I guess you heard that, huh?" Back in Nordopolica, Raven had been walking in the business district's hallways, singing to himself. He'd thought that Luke had stayed where he had been in the inn, in that room. Jade eyes lifting to meet his own turquoise, Luke nodded.

"Yeah. Master Van said only Seventh Fonists could use Yulia's hymns, much less know them. He used to sing them to me when I was a kid, but I've forgotten most of it."

"So what d'ya want with me, then?" Raven asked, even though he knew in his heart what the boy would ask of him. It was only fitting, after all, as the archer had been the one to suggest it in the first place.

"Like I said before," Luke began, casting his gaze back to the glassy oasis water, "I'm not a fonist. So I can't really control fonons other than using them to alter my strike artes. Hell, I've never even so much as willingly touched the Seventh."

"Luke, I'm not sure if I'm the one you should be asking for this." Raven's countenance changed from his earlier calm to one bordering on apprehension. It was easy enough to accompany these kids, just live this life as easily as he could before the time came to carry out his orders. If he gave what Luke asked of him … things would just get complicated. There was no way … he wouldn't be like _him!_

"You said it yourself." Luke said flatly, adamantly refusing to back down now that his question was up in the air. "I need to find someone to help me control my—Lorelei's—power. There's no one else. No one. What if there really are people who want to manipulate me because of it?" Like the Oracle Knights, the God-Generals in particular. Like the highest ranking people in the Empire that did remember the Score and what it foretold. Seventeen years was a long time to hold a grudge, whatever it had been about in the first place. If Luke's place in the Score foretold prosperity at a time when the Empire was crumbling from within … He wouldn't have a choice if they knew.

Faced with that much, Raven was completely and utterly defeated. Raven grimaced. How was he supposed to refuse after hearing _that? _He sighed, rolling his eyes skyward. These young'uns were really running him past his limit.

"Fine, if you're that serious about it. Now, stand up." Raven approached Luke, and the young knight rose from his spot against the palm tree. "The Seventh Fonon is distinctly different from the other fonons …"

Raven really didn't want to do this. But the small glimmer of gratitude in Luke's eyes as the boy drank in every word cut through the feeble barriers he'd thrown up against the outside world, hitting home. He knew that look in those impossibly green eyes fixed on no other but him. Besides gratefulness, there was something else in there, something the archer had long since given up on …

_Hope._

--

A/N: So apparently there is a theme of Raven+Luke. Shut up, I love them! (Shot.) Anywho, something to look forward to next chapter is an epic battle, mostly what I wondered when the God-Generals play, Dude, Where's My Landship?


	8. In The Sea of Sand

A/N: Chapter turned out longer than I thought; and though the GG's don't make an appearance this time, we get to see a certain Colonel's landship!

--

Yuri had to keep himself from glaring at each of Cumore's knights scattered in the town in the morning, when they set off for their happy little desert trek. Like he thought yesterday, these knights were here to keep the townspeople silent on whatever was happening, to keep them under as much a literal lock and key as much as proverbial. The innkeeper at least was able to provide them with large, durable canteens for water, and to tip them to the fact they could harvest more water from cacti if they came across any.

As they filled up their canteens at the town's oasis for their first helping of water, Yuri's mind drifted to the night before, Luke's shield left at the foot of a bed, where its owner had not only left it, but rather carelessly. That wasn't like Luke, the boy might be careless, but never with his sword and shield, symbols of his post as an Imperial Knight, and a ranking one at that. Even though in battle his weapons of course would get worn, Yuri had always seen Luke taking the initiative to care for them. Once he had freaked out after Ghasfarost on the way back to Dahngrest when some bandits had put a dent in his shield. If Luke felt he had to leave his shield behind, he normally would have put it somewhere where people wouldn't accidentally kick it over or some such.

In reality, Yuri knew why Luke had left his shield where he had. He'd left the inn, intending to go look for the young captain. It hadn't been difficult, Mantaic was a small town. By the oasis, Luke sat against a palm tree, talking to the only other person that was absent from their room: Raven. Yuri wasn't a fan of eavesdropping, so he'd turned to leave when Luke's frustrated voice fell over his ears. Ah. Luke was aggravated with the knights here, for the same reasons Yuri was and then some. A captain without men was no captain.

That tugged a string of guilt. Yuri hadn't wanted to demean Luke, much less in front of the knights, but he was trying to protect Estelle, whom the knights as much as the nobles kept in the castle like their own little pet bird, to sing for them the song they wanted. At that time when Luke had joined them on Alexei's command, Yuri had been afraid that the Royal Guard, including the one that led them, would force Estelle to return to Zaphias, whether she willed it or not. Now, Yuri knew that Luke wasn't the kind of person to force others to do his bidding, though he'd commanded his knights as well as any captain should.

_You're a Seventh Fonist, aren't you?_

That had made Yuri freeze to the spot. He didn't claim to know anything about these so-called fonons Raven had introduced to them in the Weasand of Cados at the aer krene. He understood as much as what the archer had said, that there were six types of fonons with their own vibration patterns and like aer, could be used to invoke certain elemental phenomenon, like magic. Unlike magic and aer, you didn't need a bodhi blastia to use fonons, though what one had to do to use fonons was beyond Yuri. But Raven hadn't said anything about a seventh type of fonon. Yet there was the Don's right hand man, admitting to being a fonist that used the Seventh Fonon. More to sate his own curiosity than anything else, Yuri had stayed where he was, listening to Raven explain the Seventh Fonon to Luke, and how to control it.

The Seventh Fonon was different than all the other fonons in that it was the fonon of sound, the power to harm, the power to heal. That made Yuri quirk a brow. So, by using this Seventh Fonon, people could use healing artes without a blastia? Like Estelle? No, he thought, not like Estelle. Estelle's power was different from Luke's, because Estelle's used aer, like Rita had said. Nobody had anything like she did. But something Luke had said to Raven bothered Yuri. The boy thought there were people that might want to manipulate Luke because of his ability to use this Seventh Fonon. But if it were true that other people—like Raven—could use it, too, what made Luke so special?

A deep blue caught his eye from the direction of the bath house, and Yuri had turned to see Judith. She must have finished her bath, though she dressed as usual, and her hair looked no different. From the way her eyes fell and how her mouth set, he knew that whatever made Luke special, she knew. And it made his stomach drop—she regarded it almost in the same way Estelle was special, though their powers were fundamentally different.

"Judy," He had said, leaning nonchalantly on the wall of a nearby building. He didn't bother trying to hide the fact he'd overheard the conversation between the Altosk guildsman and the Royal Guardsman. He folded his arms like he always did, looking relaxed, but he held his katana by its ribbon, as if to remind whoever watched him that he had it, and wasn't afraid to use it. "Do you think Luke's special like Estelle?"

The Krityan folded her hands behind her, like an innocent girl. "They're both dangerous, but for different reasons."

Yuri studied her under the desert moonlight. Geraios was what the Kritya called the Dawn Age, a period of two thousand years ago, where blastia technology was at its peak, the world had been united under the banner of a single empire, and the prophecy known as the Score had been born. The Oracle Knights wanted Luke because he was directly mentioned in that Score, to bring prosperity to the Empire. Luke's own admission rang in his ears.

_It said I was born with the power of Lorelei._

"Judy, what's the power of Lorelei?" Yuri asked, hard granite eyes locked with liquid wine. The Krityan knew much more than she was letting on, not only in regards to Luke but also to Estelle and why she had to see every single blastia they come across destroyed beyond repair. He couldn't help but feel that somehow he had heard the name Lorelei before. Well, he was four years old when Daath and the Empire broke off, maybe he'd heard the Score read when he was little, heard of the Order of Lorelei.

"The power to heal," Judith said simply. "And the power to destroy."

"So …" Yuri raised an eyebrow, "the Seventh Fonon?"

She nodded.

"But—Luke's not the only one who can use it! That doesn't make him special!"

Giving a small laugh, the Krityan shook her head. "Well, you don't have to worry about it. I actually have an idea."

Yuri's mouth went into a flat line, his fingers tightening their grip on his sword. "That wouldn't have anything to do with sticking a lance through Luke, would it?" He could see why Judith wanted to destroy blastia—whenever aer contamination happened, the results were disastrous and could have been much worse had the machine been left alone. But Estelle was not a machine, and nor was Luke. Judith frowned, as if saddened that Yuri would even think of such a thing.

"No," She whispered softly, a hand tightening into a fist. "Nothing like." She planned not to strike Luke down, no, what she planned might actually save him. Even if Phaeroh turned down Estelle's case, Luke's was not beyond salvation. The Krityan herself had picked up the key piece, the strange sphere Asch had in his possession atop the Tower of Gears. Without another word, she turned on her heel and left, leaving Yuri to his own confounded thoughts.

-

In the shade of the marketplace awning just on the outskirts of Mantaic, Luke stared flabbergasted at the … _monstrosity _Judith held out to him on a thin wire hanger. It was nothing that an Imperial Knight at all, much less a captain, would ever think of being caught dead wearing. Granted, Luke had to thank Yulia profusely that the outfit wasn't the horrible pink dress poor Karol had been forced in. But still! Luke made a gesture at it with an arm.

"Well, it wouldn't be quite so bad if there were an entire shirt instead of half of one." He wasn't going to walk around with a bare midriff! Maybe the Kritya liked that sort of thing, but he was an Imperial Knight! He had at least some dignity!

"Oh, but I'd like to see myself how well Imperial Knights sculpt their bodies," Judith sang sweetly, completely unfazed by the way Luke's face burned a fierce red at the nonchalant comment. The outfit on the hanger she held consisted of a white jacket with short sleeves like a T-shirt, hemmed in gold thread, with coattails, red on the inside, black pants with pockets marked by yellow cloth, and a black shirt that, along with how the jacket was cut, would expose Luke's midsection if he decided to wear it. Which Luke wasn't inclined to do without a fight.

"Well enough, that's all!" Luke said hotly, trying pointlessly to ignore the way Guy was evidently holding in uproarious laughter at the idea of his former master wearing the clothing Judith had for him. "Besides, I'm not fighting anything without armor! That's asking for trouble!"

"Who needs armor?" Karol asked with a huge grin on his face. Undoubtedly he was glad that he wasn't the only one Judith insisted on dressing up. And he didn't see what the problem with the outfit was, he thought it would look cool on Luke! But the Royal Guardsman was so self-conscious. "You're the only one wearing armor here, Luke."

"That's right," Guy said, tapping the hilt of his katana. "And we've survived so far, haven't we?"

"No kidding," Yuri muttered. Like monsters, guildsmen, bullheaded Imperial Knights, one of the God-Generals, and then of course who could forget Zagi, the assassin with more than a few screws loose? His frown disappeared as the corners of his mouth twinged upward, looking at the outfit Judith had comissioned. It would be a bit baggy on Luke, as the Krityan's model was none other than Yuri himself since their build was similar. Somehow he thought she also couldn't resist having a tailor quite literally sticking him on pins and needles.

"And anyway," The dark-haired swordsman continued at Luke's near pouting, "it's gonna get hot out here in the desert. In those clothes you won't be burning up within an hour."

Luke was nothing short of flabbergasted. "But—but—"

"C'mon, at least try them on already!" Rita said irately, impatiently tapping her foot in the sand. "Then we can stop standing around here and get something done."

"Yes, Luke, please?" Estelle added, her emerald eyes softening as she examined the ensemble near Judith. "I think they'd quite become you."

"But—" Luke was at a loss for any more coherent words. What about _bare midriff _did they not understand!? Granted, Krityans like Judith even some male Krityans he'd seen around the capital bared their middles with no problems, but Luke was not a Krityan!

"That sounded like an order from tha princess, o sir Royal Guardsman," Raven cupped his chin with a ridiculously wide smirk on his face. "You don't wanna disappoint the future empress, do ya?"

"Okay, going aboard the Atherum was one thing," Luke protested even as Judith took him by the elbow and began steering him toward the inn, "this is just unneccessary! C'mon, please? Guy! Help!"

The blond swordsman at his friend's plight did take a step toward Luke, but at a dangerous gleam from the Krityan's eye he stopped dead. A nervous grin broke up on his face. "Heh, sorry Luke, but I think Judith wins this time."

"Indeed I do," She said sweetly, and without another word, disappeared into the inn, pulling Luke with her. There was nobody to stop her from dressing him up as she wanted like he was a doll, not her first victim and certainly not her last if the way she glanced at Guy was any indication. No man was safe from her eccentricities with clothing, not the boss of her own guild and certainly not an Imperial Knight captain.

For all Judith's quality of being _out there, _she at least was not so brazen as to strip Luke down herself. Well, maybe to start removing his plates of armor before he suddenly wanted nothing more than to try on the outfit she had comissioned just for him, how could he in good conscience say no? He ought to be glad the beautiful Krityan had thought to have such a gift made for him! That was what Luke had to say to make Judith give him some elbow room to even change into those clothes. Thankfully she turned her back, staying in the one room inn herself to make sure he didn't try to escape at the last moment.

Luke inwardly mourned for his Imperial Knight uniform as he changed outfits. It was a little baggy, more so the pants than the coat, but fit him well enough. He wondered when Judith had had the time to have these clothes made; amidst all the chaos he just couldn't see it, though the Kritya had their own ways of making time. He noticed as he put on the jacket there was a kind of face on the back, like an angry or fierce monster. What the heck? Why was that there? Oh, well. He completed the ensemble with a pair of brown gloves, belting his sword at his back like he usually did though he had to hold his shield in his bag.

"Okay, done." Luke said, looking at his reflection in the life size mirror on the wall. Although he did feel self conscious at the fact his midsection was exposed (he hadn't really noticed until now just how defined his abs were, either), Estelle was right: these clothes did suit him. Without his armor, he felt lighter on his feet, but he still dreaded fighting anything without his plate mail.

"I really do have an eye for fashion," Judith said with a wide smile on her face as she examined her handiwork on the Imperial Knight. Luke's face burned with the compliment but he didn't disagree. She folded her arms, thinking. "I just might have to start up my own little tailoring business. It'd help with advertising our guild: made with loving hands by Brave Vesperia."

Luke quirked a brow, surprised. "You made these yourself? I thought you had them commissioned."

"Some parts of it, yes," Judith nodded, "but much of it I did myself. Do you not like it?"

Oh, great. Now how could he complain about wearing it? "N-no, I do, I do," He maintained, his voice going higher in pitch as she approached him. He was already wearing the clothes she made for him, what more did the Krityan want? He blinked as Judith reached for one of his palms, withdrawing something from her own bag. She deposited in his open hand a translucent red sphere the size of his fist, glowing softly with its own light. Carved into the sphere like a glyph was a strange symbol.

Luke stared at it, confused. "What's this? A blastia core?" Judith shrugged.

"I don't think so, but I think you were meant to have it."

"What?" Luke turned the sphere over in his hands, examining it curiously. "What makes you say that?"

"Why, Asch the Bloody dropped it on top of Ghasfarost." Judith replied in a as-a-matter-of-factly tone. "And he wanted to approach you alone, so it must have been meant for you."

"Okay …" Luke put the sphere away in his bag, nestling it in the folds of his Imperial Knight uniform. Asch the Bloody meant for him to have it? Why? It made sense, why else would the God-General have called him out on top of the Tower of Gears? He shook his head, he couldn't figure out why, the only thing he knew about Asch was that they had the same face. Even then in so simple a thing the answer escaped him. Who was Asch? A long-lost brother? But that couldn't be, Duke Fabre had only one son. He'd heard geneaologists claim that cousins looked more alike than siblings, yet were there cousins that looked identical, down to the last detail?

Like the aer krene, like the miasma, like the clear ciel crystal, Luke had to accept he just didn't know, and fretting about it wasn't going to change anything.

Luke walked out of the inn beside Judith to a veritable round of applause as everyone took a good look at their very own Imperial Knight captain wearing a Krityan made ensemble. Guy laughed and said Luke wore it well enough, Estelle had positively _squealed _in delight, Yuri stifled a chortle, Karol was already coming up with one of his trademark "cool" nicknames for the look, Rita didn't care much for it, and Raven walked up to them and said:

"Oh, Judy darlin', what I wouldn't give for you ta dress me up with that amount of love—" He didn't get to finish before Rita's spellbook somehow found its way to collide with the back of his skull. "Ow," He groused, rubbing the newly formed bruise as the Imperial mage seethed behind him. Repede growled, seemingly in annoyance.

"All right, we can add getting Luke to climb out of his tin suit to the guild's achievement list," Yuri said, pointedly ignoring the way Luke glared at him. "Everybody got everything? It's gonna be a long day."

-

And a long day it was. The desert monsters were nothing to sneeze at, fire birds spouting gouts of flame, basilisks trying to sink their fangs into anything that moved, cacti creatures shooting needles and causing their own kind of poison, with the occasional bandit trying to steal something—or someone—valuable. The unforgivable heat beat down on them with no shade in sight, and they found themselves running through their water supply so quickly that Yuri had to impose a rationing rule.

Luke had been dehydrated before, training long days in Deidon Hold, fighting back packs of monsters and helping his Guard round up criminals against Imperial law. But that was nothing compared to the searing agony of this desert. Every drop of water was precious and felt like the breath of life every time he dared take a sip, cruelly denying himself more because then he'd be stuck with no water until they happened across the next batch of cacti.

People suffered headaches from dehydration, and Luke suffered from such a headache now. Though naturally it hurt, it had nothing on the migraines he usually put up with whenever the mysterious voice decided to take a tug at his sanity. But fighting in this heat, dehydrated with not nearly enough water, was taking its toll on him. They rotated teams according to who tired quickest and needed the most rest, namely Karol (the poor boy was on the verge of collapse, and his heavy weapons didn't help) and Rita (she kept casting powerful magic even when she should have rested long ago, claiming using magic made her feel good even though she sometimes made it hotter).

Estelle was third to nearly collapse, as much from an overuse of her healing artes as the intense heat. Yuri had to have Repede and Judith to keep her on the reserve line as he, Luke, Guy, and Raven took the brunt of the fighting. It was another group of bandits, looking nothing like any Imperial citizens or Dahngrest guildsmen Luke had ever seen.

Sweat rolled profusely off his brow, though by all accounts Luke didn't know whether he should be sweating anymore at this point. These bandits were dressed similarly to the others they'd come across, wearing light robes to accommodate movement and the heat of the desert. They wore cowls so that their whole faces couldn't be seen, and their formation was easy enough to figure out: three front line fighters with a magic user in the back. Immediately, Guy and Yuri got to work, leaving Raven to engage the magic user, fitting as he was also long range.

Luke hadn't been trained like any other Imperial Knight, sticking strictly to form, never knowing exactly what to do in unexpected situations whenever fighting arose. Van was a harsh master, never once letting up until he was thoroughly convinced that, when the time came, Luke would be able to completely disarm all opposition and eliminate it, sometimes brutally. It was never easy, applying such training to actual battle, but it was so much harder when people were involved. Whenever Luke fought another person, everything seemed to go in slow motion.

The bandit in front of him charged, brandishing a sword. A golden bracelet studded with a jewel shone, a bodhi blastia, no doubt a trophy from a previous skirmish. Luke felt light on his feet, not only because of the absence of his armor, but also for the extreme heat of the desert. He caught the first blow on his shield, pushing his enemy back, thrusting his own blade forward. It was shorter than most swords, but the metal was thick, with a weight of its own. Sparks flew as sword struck sword, arte against arte. The aer of the bandit's strike artes forced Luke back, sand flying everywhere as they shuffled from place to place, the clashing of swords ringing throughout the area.

_In a perfect world, _Van would say during their sparring sessions, _people would not fight one another. But life outside the barriers is unforgiving. If you do end up fighting people out there, they will not rest until you or they are dead. You cannot die. You have a job to do, and so must ensure you survive._

Luke hated it. He grabbed the sword arm of the bandit he fought, twisting the wrist so the man grunted in pain, dropping his weapon in the sand swirling about their feet. Even without a blade the bandit would not surrender; with his free hand he made to grab for Luke's throat, only to get a shield thrust in his face. Three seconds later, the man sprawled dying in the sand, side slashed open, blood splattered on the earth and slick off Luke's blade. Around him, the others finished disposing of their opponents as well: Guy and Yuri teamed up on the other two front line fighters, brutally cutting them down. Raven took down the mage with a Wind Blade and a well-aimed arrow to the heart.

"Everyone all right?" Raven called. With Estelle and Karol both out of comission, it fell to him to heal everyone's hurts with his Love Shot arte. Yuri was fine aside from a bruise on his hand from punching his enemy square in the jaw, but Guy wasn't as lucky, having sprained his foot in a Stalagmite magic arte he couldn't dodge in time. The archer knelt to look at the injury. Though it wasn't pretty, it wasn't as serious as it could have been considering the spell that had been involved. Raven was sorely tempted to crack a joke as he healed it, but the look on Guy's face killed it flat before it could leave his mouth.

As Luke took a small sip of his water, he noticed that Raven healed not with aer, but the Seventh Fonon. He was still getting the hang of sensing the Seventh amid all the other fonons, but whenever he did sense it, a shiver always coursed through him, like the touch of a ghost. Estelle and Karol's healing artes felt heavier, like a heady perfume whenever they used them, but the Seventh Fonon was much lighter, more subtle, and yet worked just as well as aer, if not better.

Raven had said the previous night that when Luke got better at gathering and using the Seventh Fonon, he ought to learn some healing artes to take some of the burden of curing off Estelle, and fully fledged artes instead of just supporting ones like Love Shot and Nice Aid Smash would be much more dependable. He could heal, he had the innate ability. Just that thought alone made Luke stare at the body of the man whose life he cut short, snuffed out like a candle.

He stared at the gaping gash that split the skin open, at the blood that was beginning to bake in the heat, at the white flash of exposed bone, perhaps a rib. The Imperial Knights saved lives, it was true, by killing monsters and bandits such as these would visit the same fate upon innocent people. But the Knights saved those lives by taking others'. His frown deep and jagged, Luke silently swore that he would learn true healing artes, he would learn to save lives in another way besides just taking them.

-

Before long, night fell, and they had to pitch a camp under what shelter they could find on the far end of the sea of sand, huddled up against the sheer wall of a rocky plateau. Though the heat had been unbearable in the day, at night it was incredibly cold. A fire crackled in the center of their makeshift camp, Luke staring into its red gold depths. They had yet to cover even a fourth of the huge expanse of sand, and even if they wouldn't miss Phaeroh if they saw him, how would they get to him? Talk about taking on the impossible for Brave Vesperia's first job.

"I see you're taking wearing Judy's clothes well enough," Yuri's voice arose across from Luke, the swordsman returning to camp after he had gone off to find cacti with which to refill their water bottles. Luke shrugged, still staring into the fire.

"Well, you were right, I wasn't roasting as badly as I would be if I were wearing my armor."

"Though you have seen better days fighting in your plate," Yuri observed, nodding to the small cuts and gashes that had scabbed over courtesy of Estelle's healing. If the princess had been at her full strength she would have made it so that there were no scars.

Luke nodded, he wouldn't lie. He had to rely on his shield and sword parries more often instead of just letting a blow glance off a shoulder piece or a gauntlet.

"What's bothering you?" Yuri asked, sitting down by the fire. Repede was usually with him, but no doubt the dog was out watching for enemies. "You're never this quiet."

Luke tapped the surface of his shield that rested at his side. "I was just thinking. Estelle heals people, I cut them down."

Yuri quirked a brow. "So? If you don't cut them down first, they'll do the same to you without a second thought. Life is tough outside the barriers."

"Yeah, Master Van said the same thing. I can't let myself die just because I'd feel bad about killing another person. I have a job to do. But. I don't want to save lives just by killing people. Estelle can save lives just by being there. She doesn't have to kill anyone in order to keep someone alive."

"If that's how you feel," Yuri began, getting Luke's attention, "then should you even be in the Knights? Not that you're incompetent," The older man held up a hand to forestall any protests, "you do a much better job than idiots like Cumore who can't do anything or Schwann who doesn't even show up. But I'm just saying, you can always leave the Knights if you feel there's something else you can do."

"But there's nothing else I can do," Luke sighed, brow furrowed. "All my life, I've been brought up expecting to go into the Imperial Knights, to serve the imperial family as best as I'm able. I never had a choice."

"But you do." Yuri said pointedly, his eyes hardening somewhat. "You're only in the Knights because you choose to be."

"Heh," Luke chortled in amusement. "And Raven said you lectured me in Nordopolica because you didn't want me to give up everything I had just like you did."

"I did _not _give up everything," Yuri retorted, frowning. "Whatever, I'm just saying you always have a choice. Nothing is set in stone."

An awkward silence fell over them as the irony of that statement made itself apparent. Luke snorted, bitter.

"Nothing is set in stone? _ND 2000, in the Empire of Kimlasca will be born one who inherits the power of Lorelei. He will be a boy of royal blood and hair of red. He shall be called the Light of the Sacred Flame, and he shall lead the Empire to new prosperity." _He paused, to let the words of the Score sink in. "Two thousand years ago Yulia predicted that. And here I am."

"Look, how do you know that would have come true if Yulia hadn't predicted that?" Yuri spat, evidently annoyed at Luke's attitude.

"How could anyone _plan _for that?" Luke demanded, just as annoyed. "Yulia didn't plan my birth, she predicted it!"

"And how did she do that?" Yuri's voice was steadily rising, even though the others were trying to sleep. "Did she just sit down and think, oh, in two thousand years a boy named Luke will be born?"

"No," Luke spat, jade eyes narrowed. "she didn't think it up. She read it."

"How?" Yuri repeated, patience running thin.

"Raven didn't mention it back in the Weasand of Cados," Luke didn't want to reveal the fact he could use the Seventh Fonon, much less to Yuri of all people, but he had to make the man understand. He had to understand why Luke always felt so cornered, so helpless in living even his own life. While the rest of the Empire forgot the Score and shut themselves up in their barricaded cities, the guildsmen living with wild abandon, Luke had always been locked into the life of an Imperial Knight. "But there's seven types of fonons, not six. The Seventh is the fonon of sound, it has the power to heal, and … if you were good enough with it, you can read the future. That is why Yulia's Score is so accurate."

Yuri knew about the Seventh Fonon already in that it was the fonon of sound, it could heal, it could harm, but he didn't know Yulia had read her absolute prophecy with it. He opened his mouth to say something else when Repede's howling cut him off. Yuri stood, katana halfway out of its leather scabbard, the firelight bending off the sharp edge. Luke also had a hand on his sword hilt, though he only got up on one knee before out of the darkness appeared soldiers.

From the clinking of chain mail, Luke thought it was the Oracle Knights, maybe Asch the Bloody returning to have another go after his little stunt in Nordopolica had failed. But once he saw the soldiers stepping into the firelight, he knew immediately they were not Oracle Knights. Instead of the Daathic colors of brown, gold, grey, and black, these men were dressed in cool aqua colors. The colors of the Malkuth Empire. The incident with Yeager on the road that led into Akzeriuth flashed across his mind. Did these Malkuth soldiers think it was the Kimlascan Empire's doing, even with the bodies of guild assassins in the cavern?

"Yuri, stand down," Luke said, slowly standing with his arms held up.

"Like you need to tell me," Yuri replied, shoving his sword back in its leather casing but he did not let it leave his hand. Even from the darkness that pressed against their camp, he could see they were outnumbered. Fighting guildsmen and bandits were one thing. Fighting a trained army was quite another. And no, Schwann and Cumore's knights did not count.

The Malkuthian soldiers fanned around the small camp, weapons at the ready though they made no move to attack. Luke found himself wondering as the wall of soldiers shifted to allow more people through, what was the Malkuth army doing in the Sands of Koghor? The trading city of Chesedonia lay _beyond _the desert, not in it. The soldiers stopped moving, and the man apparently in charge came forward.

"My, my," Said a tall man, Luke guessed around six feet as he looked about the small camp. The firelight glared off a pair of glasses perched on his pale, ageless face, though when he glanced down, the glare subsided slightly, and Luke could see blood red eyes. Golden brown hair swept his shoulders, and his uniform was different from that of the general soldiers behind him, a deep sea green. He carried himself highly, but not as if he were non-verbally saying he was holier-than-thou.

"Sir, these people are obviously Kimlascan," Said a grunt at the leader's side. "Do you think they could be more civilians sent out of Mantaic?"

Civilians? Mantaic? What? Luke blinked, wanting to ask but he held his tongue. Soldiers did not speak out of turn, especially in the hands of another army. But Yuri was no soldier.

"What're you talking about?" He demanded, unafraid of holding his sword despite being surrounded by soldiers. "We were never sent from Mantaic, we came out here on our own."

"Did you really?" Asked the brunette commander, an amused smile stretching across his lips. "The two dozen or so townsfolk we rescued in the desert beg to differ."

Now Luke spoke in his surprise. "Two dozen? They were all out here?"

The commanding officer raised a hand, gesturing to the wing of soldiers at his back. He gave the order without hesitation.

"Arrest that young man."

"_What?" _Luke involuntarily took a step back as the blue clad men came forward, forcing himself not to draw his sword. Yuri, however, was not going to give anyone up without a fight. He stepped between the group of soldiers and Luke, ready to draw his sword if a fight were to break out. Luke clapped a hand on his shoulder, shaking his head. "No, don't fight, we don't stand a chance." The Fabre looked up past Yuri, at the red-eyed officer.

"Can I ask what charges you have against me?" International charges, no less. Alexei was not going to let this go when he heard about it. Accusing any of his subordinates of a crime was accusing the Commandant himself.

"As an Imperial Knight, we have reason to believe you might have something to do with these civilians being turned out into the desert with no provisions. You are to be taken onboard for questioning."

Luke blinked. He wasn't wearing his uniform, how did they know—then, seeing, the question in his eyes, the commander withdrew from a pocket in his coat a folded piece of paper. Luke audibly groaned, slapping a palm to his face. _Ugh. _It was that damn wanted poster, _again!_

"There has been a warrant throughout Kimlasca and beyond for your whereabouts," The commander said with a musical lilt in his voice. Clearly he thought Luke's reaction to seeing the poster amusing. "As such, there have been descriptions and photographs. Though I must admit, I'm rather surprised to see you out of uniform, Mr. Luke fon Fabre."

If anyone but Judith had for all intents and purposes forced this new outfit on him, Luke would have been of a strong want to go and promptly beat that person senseless. Bad enough to be out in the desert risking death not only by attack but also heat stroke, he just had to be caught wearing this—thing—by another soldier, and a commanding officer no less!

"So, what, you think I deserted the Imperial Knights?" Luke managed at last. It would make sense, though the warrant for him claimed Yuri kidnapped him, it easily looked as if he left the Knights of his own volition. "And who are you? I can see you're with Malkuth, but …"

"My apologies," The man pushed his slipping glasses up the bridge of his nose. "I'm Colonel Jade Curtiss, Third Division, Malkuth Imperial Forces. You are Luke fon Fabre of the Imperial Knights, captain of the Royal Guard, are you not?" When Luke nodded, Jade turned to address Yuri. "And here we have the infamous Mr. Yuri Lowell, abductor of not one but two members of the Kimlascan Imperial family."

Yuri scowled. "Sorry to burst your bubble, but those two came with me on their own. Abduction usually requires force."

The Colonel never missed a beat. "And who is to say that you haven't coerced them somehow, or even brainwashed them into following you? A desert is a rather unlikely place for a stroll."

Luke could swear he felt the mutual animosity sparking between Yuri and Colonel Curtiss. This tension was nothing the young noble and the dark-haired swordsman had had, even from the very beginning. Luke felt he had to do something before the world erupted in the violent upheaval that would no doubt result if those two clashed in battle.

"Wait, Colonel Curtiss—"

"You can just call me Jade," The Colonel interjected, shrugging. "I'm not accustomed to being called by my family name."

"Jade, then." Luke said, almost rolling his eyes. "You said 'onboard.' Onboard what? We're nowhere near the ocean."

"Ah," Jade smiled, and quite suddenly Luke felt that perhaps he shouldn't have asked. "If you'll kindly wake your companions and pack up, I'd be happy to show you."

-

Luke had thought when he first saw the Heracles in Dahngrest that it was the most amazing battleship he'd ever seen. That was before he was introduced to the Tartarus. The Heracles was incredible, it was true, but that ship had been confined to the ocean. The Tartarus was a different kind of machine: it was a _landship. _Back at home Guy would read books he'd imported from Malkuth about their technology, different from blastia. Malkuth used machines that harnessed the power of fonons instead of aer, dubbed fonic technology or fontech.

Luke could understand Guy's fascination with fontech, if it could make entire ships able to travel over land. And he'd looked closely as Jade and his men led them onboard through the main hatch: the ship didn't actually touch the ground below. It could be using Third Fonons to keep itself marginally above the Second Fonons of the earth so it wasn't carving a path through the land it traveled through, though in a place like Sands of Koghor it wouldn't make much difference. The Tartarus was a huge ship, easily matching the Heracles in size.

The Tartarus was a military ship and so didn't have the comforts of a passenger vehicle, but Luke didn't mind one bit. He was too wrapped up in the sheer oddness of being on a ship on land. He was on a ship, but on land … not the water. Well, that just meant the ship wouldn't rock like it would on the ocean. He didn't have any motion sickness problems; it seemed the earth was more forgiving than the sea.

Guy, meanwhile, was having the time of his life. He studied fontech from the comfort of his room in the manor, always buried in his books, and even managing to build little gadgets of his own though the Empire obviously held blastia in much higher esteem. But this was the first time he'd come face to face with real fontech, and something like the Tartarus violently ripped out Guy's inner child, the calm and collected guardian Luke grew up with all but gone for the time being.

"Guy, if you don't shut up about the Tartarus I swear I'll throw you at Rita." Luke said from his seat by the window; Jade had left his party in a cabin while he went to attend whatever business he had. The Colonel promised something of an explanation at a later point in time. His earlier remark about not being in uniform stung at his already severely wounded pride, so the first chance Luke got he promptly changed from the outfit Judith made to his Royal Guard uniform, armor and all. Onboard a landship (a wonderfully air conditioned one at that), he wouldn't be walking around under the sun asking for a heat stroke.

"Sorry," Guy laughed, rubbing the back of his head like he always did when he was sheepish or nervous, "but I've never been on a landship before! And it's all fontech! I mean, I heard the rumors about the Heracles, but this is just—there are no words to describe!"

"I don't get how these fonons can support a machine this big," Rita scoffed from her perch on top of one pair of two bunk beds. "With blastia, cores are great concentrations of aer extended and shaped through blastia bodies. Just one core can power anything from a fountain to half a city!"

"But you can't make cores," Guy pointed out. "You have to rely on whatever you find buried in the ground, and when you use them all up, they're gone for good. Fonons are everywhere all the time!"

"Whatever!" The girl mage snapped, clearly fed up with Guy's enthusiasm for what she saw as the anti-herald of blastia, "I still say blastia are better. My magic can trounce whatever a 'fonist' has to throw at me, too!"

The cabin door opened, and in walked an at ease Colonel Jade Curtiss, two young teenages in tow: a girl of about thirteen wearing a magenta uniform that echoed Oracle Knight style, and a boy of the same age wearing a robe of light green, his hair and eyes a deep verdant color. About the boy's neck Luke recognized the gold tuning fork, the symbol of Yulia. Jade smiled, rather nonchalant to the people he had for all intents and purposes taken prisoner.

"That would depend on what fonist you face, Miss Imperial mage. I must say I find using fonic artes preferable to magic via a blastia. I've always excelled through the efforts of my own hands."

Rita went positively purple in the face at Jade's cynical comment. Raven was right, whenever someone challenged her beliefs, she went ballistic. Yuri was smirking from his spot on the floor beside Repede; he always found it amusing whenever someone else was put on the spot.

"So, wanna tell us why we're here?" Raven asked from where he leaned on a wall, hands folded behind his head. "We were having the most wonderful dreams before ya decided to take us for a spin."

"I bet you were, old man," Rita muttered vengefully though she still glared daggers at Jade.

"Firstly, I believe introductions are in order." Jade said, as if he didn't know Rita willed him dead just by looking. Either that or he was purposely ignoring her, Luke had a feeling it was the latter. "I'm Colonel Jade Curtiss, Third Division Malkuth Imperial Forces."

Jade already knew Luke and Yuri's names, so those two remained silent.

"I'm Karol Capel," The budding guildmaster spoke up on the bottom bunk of the same one Rita sat on top of, next to Estelle. "I'm founder of the new guild Brave Vesperia."

"Ah, guilds are always fun," Jade said with a theatrical enthusiasm. The teenage girl that followed him inside along with the boy giggled.

"Colonel, you're terrible."

"Now, now, Anise, you're going to end up hurting my feelings."

"Uh, Guy Cecil," The blond swordsman piped up next, although from the way the girl, Anise, continued to banter with Jade, there was a firm bet they weren't listening.

"I'm Estellise," Estelle said, and when she did the playful bickering between Anise and Jade stopped. Their eyes turned on her. "But you can call me Estelle for short."

"I'm Raven," Said the older guildsman, no more than that. He acted as if he didn't care for the Malkuth military, and perhaps he didn't.

Jade's eyes turned to Rita, blood red meeting verdant emerald. The mage was still noticably angry about the Colonel's earlier remark about magic, but she swallowed her rage, at least for now. "Rita Mordio. Not very pleased to meet you."

When her name fell upon his ears, Jade blinked, brow slightly quirked. His lips parted, as if he were on the verge of asking a question but the rational part of his mind commanded him to hold his tongue. Instead, he stood to the side to better allow the boy Anise accompanied to see the occupants of the cabin. The boy in green gave a wide smile and a gracious bow.

"Hello, pleased to meet you all. I'm Ion, Fon Master of the Order of Lorelei." He touched Anise's arm, addressing her next. "And this is Ansie, one of my Fon Master Guardians."

"Whoa, wait up," Yuri said, and Ion turned to look at him inquisitively. "The Order of Lorelei? So you're the boss of the Oracle Knights and their God-Generals?"

"Yes," Ion answered, though one of his eyebrows was still raised to express his curiosity. "Have you had trouble with the Oracle Knights?"

"More than I'd care to tell." Yuri said gruffly, anger obvious in his tone of voice. Ion frowned.

"I'm sorry if they have given you trouble; affairs within the Order of Lorelei are a bit … turbulent at the moment."

Yuri snorted at the Fon Master's reply. If the disruption of a tournament at Nordopolica was Ion's idea of "trouble," he hated to see what Daath itself was like. Or Malkuth for that matter since it seemed that half of the world's original Empire still followed Yulia's Score slavishly. Rita's own remarks about the Empire and the Score rang in his ears: _If it promises prosperity, I can't say the Empire's been doing all that great without it._

"What's going on, Ion?" Luke asked, breaking the uncomfortable silence. "Why is the leader of the Order of Lorelei onboard a Malkuthian landship? For that matter why is part of the Malkuth army even out here?"

"Like Jade said," Ion replied, turning toward Luke, "civilians out of Mantaic have been turning up in the Sands of Koghor, and rumor has it a great monster lived here; one that attacked the guild city of Dahngrest."

The Colonel picked up where the Fon Master left off as he felt was fit. "We questioned the people we rescued. Apparently it was a captain of the Imperial Knights that sent them out there in the first place, looking for that giant monster." His and Ion's eyes were fixed on Luke.

"It's true that we were looking for that bird, Phaeroh," Luke said slowly, carefully. One wrong move and he'd be treated as a criminal, though how Malkuth could punish the citizen of another country entirely escaped him. If Daath hadn't stopped all Score readings in Kimlasca already, that would have been another story. "But I've been separated from the Royal Guard, and if I were the one that sent those people in the Sands, why would I be out there myself?"

"True enough," Jade smiled, "that is what I thought."

"Then why--?"

"Our original purpose for crossing this desert is to provide relief for the people of Akzeriuth."

--

A/N: Sorry, the epic landship battle will have to wait til next chapter because dumb Luke wanted character development, dammit. By the way, regardless of whether anybody has read the Darken oneshot (the stats say people have been lol), it is not "officially" a part of the RG continuity, so don't worry about a certain archer spontaneously pouncing the RG captain.


	9. Beyond the Barriers

A/N: Yeah, I can't really say anything in these notes about my lack of updating frequency anymore.

* * *

"Provide relief, how?" Yuri asked, crossing his arms as he leaned against Repede's side. With Flynn gone, the Imperial hound was the closest friend he'd had, that'd been through the kinds of thick and thin that … well, saying that much would be stretching it (what ever happened to Hisca, and Chastel, he wondered, the others of Fedrock's old brigade, how were they doing …?), but the dog was a wellspring of familiarity, and comfort. So much was happening, so fast. He felt he was losing control over what happened in these situations … in his life.

Yuri did not like being out of control.

"How else? What did you think the landships were for? Sightseeing, perhaps? I did hear there were a number of crumbling ruins of interest, but this isn't a tourist's field trip." Colonel Jade Curtiss had this certain way of talking, in his demeanor, that tended to light Yuri's nerves on a special kind of fire. A kind of fire that he hadn't felt since the last time—the time he and Flynn had confronted that two-faced Imperial mage, whose reckless blastia experimentation had resulted in the casualties of many.

_Of course, there had been casualties then, as well._

_You mean …_

_My deepest condolences._

_That's …_

_His blastia, you bastard._

Yuri clenched a fist, making an effort to unstick his teeth so he could talk properly. "You were going to evacuate the townspeople of Akzeriuth, then?"

"Yes, that was the idea, anyway. En route, our landships have been discovering and picking up these Kimlascan citizens that had been turned into the Sands out of Mantaic. Chesedonia's quite a ways away from here, and as you can imagine, we don't exactly have the time to be negotiating with the Kimlascan Empire when our own city is in grave danger."

The Colonel's crimson eyes darted briefly over to the two Imperial royals in the cabin. Luke noticed in particular, they seemed to linger on him, rather than Estelle. And yet, after all, why not? Luke was just a step down in rank, in power, from the Commandant of the Imperial Knights. Perhaps Jade was thinking that his rank would prove useful in this tight spot.

But …

"I … have no power." He didn't know what he was saying, really, or even why he was saying it. Still, he felt he had to say something. "I outrank the entire brigade stationed in Mantaic, and they disregarded direct orders from me." Further: he didn't have his own cohort to enforce his orders, but he thought _that _went without saying.

"My, my," Jade positively sang in that musical lilt his voice tended to get, and Luke had to bite his tongue to keep from saying something that he might regret later on. But, man, was this Jade guy obnoxious! "It sounds as if things are just as turbulent within the Kimlascan Imperial Knights as much as they are within the Order of Lorelei, although the Order's can be attributed to two conflicting factions, rather than individual captains and their units attempting to strike out on their own."

On their own? Was Cumore truly acting on his own? Certainly, for his own interests and petty schemes of power, but Luke couldn't help but wonder. Cumore didn't strike him as the type of person to want something out of the desert. His little pet project in Heliord, it seemed he intended to make that fortress his personal base, and he'd been working with Leviathan's Claw to smuggle hoplon blastia around. Was Cumore … following orders? If he was, what had Alexei ordered in the desert?

… dammit. He'd been gone from the Knights for too long. He didn't know. Can't have known. And without Alexei's authority or men to back him up, then what good would knowing do Luke, when he had no power on his own?

Lost in thought as Luke was, it was Guy's voice that filled the silence.

"So, what you're saying is, you need to get rid of these Mantaic people, but you don't really have a feasible means of doing so. Not without starting trouble with the Kimlascan Empire."

Jade nodded, adjusting the glasses on his face. "That is exactly what I'm saying. We could drop them off at town on our way to Akzeriuth, and our landships would have to berth by the town anyway, but then, for all intents and purposes, we'd be occupying a Kimlascan settlement, and I can't imagine that would sit well with the knight captain stationed there. He'd probably send the people into the Sands again, and if we were to interfere, it could spark an international incident."

"And you can't afford that right now." Guy looked so laid back, it was amazing to Luke, how he could discuss such serious things, and appear that way. He just sat in his place in the cabin, legs crossed, his sheathed blade resting against his shoulder. That was Guy for you. Calm, cool, collected … never really panicking, unless one counted his female phobia, but … that wasn't really his fault.

"Certainly not. If something were to happen, well, to speak bluntly, we need our men, to save our own people, and as cruel as it seems, we'd have to bypass any more Mantaic dwellers we'd encounter in the desert, for the sake of the Malkuth citizens that had been in Akzeriuth."

It was a bad habit. Luke knew this. He'd tried to squash it, but maybe he could blame it on his time spent with Yuri Lowell. He hadn't meant to, but before he knew it, he was almost shouting in an outburst of angry frustration. He clenched a fist, slamming the cabin wall with a resounding clash of metal on metal.

"Then what the hell are we supposed to do?! Cumore's brigade have ignored my orders! I have no authority on my own! I'd need the Royal Guard to enforce my orders, or Commandant Alexei himself! And then there's the Oracle Knights, and the guilds, and … ugh!" He turned away, clenching his teeth, almost biting his tongue.

Everything looked impossibly hopeless.

Guy was looking at him, surprised. "Luke ..."

"... sorry. Didn't mean to do that."

Jade's voice was low. "The captain of the Commandant's elite force, not carrying any authority on his own, even though he is a member of the Kimlascan imperial family … interesting." At Ion's side, Anise looked up at him, with a quizzical tilt of her head.

"Colonel, what's the matter?"

The Malkuth soldier shrugged. "It's nothing. In fact, I had hoped to ask you for your help, Captain Fabre, but ..."

"But what?" Luke asked, glancing up at Jade. "My orders are useless right now." It was then that the Colonel had a smirk, a kind of smirk that made his stomach drop into queasy hell. This … this couldn't bode well for him, could it …

"It would seem it's not so much your help that we'd need, but, shall we say, your … cooperation."

Luke was about to respond, when Yuri cut him off, before any words could leave his mouth. It shocked him, Lowell sounded really angry, even if he never stood up or raised an arm against Colonel Curtiss.

"You want to use Luke as a bargaining chip to get Alexei to shove Cumore in line." He was agitated, this much was clear as he drummed his fingers impatiently along the leather of his sword scabbard. It made sense, and in a way, he had to admire Jade for this tactic, but he didn't like it, not one bit. Why couldn't people decide for themselves? Why was it always something, one thing, if not another?

Life outside the barriers was tough, indeed, though the monsters weren't the only reason.

"Why, yes, that is what I'm proposing." Jade cupped his chin, tapping it thoughtfully with an index finger. "In any case, Commandant Alexei cannot ignore that Malkuth forces hold such an important figure, and not just one, but two members of the Kimlascan imperial family. That's half the candidates for the Kimlascan throne, onboard a Malkuth military landship. Anything could happen."

The rest of Yuri's party was deathly silent. Karol looked white as a sheet, Estelle was pale, too, but she said nothing. She didn't know what to say. Judith was as unreadable as always, Rita didn't look as if she wanted to listen to what was going on, she was already mad, and might get angrier, but even she knew that acting out here, in this situation, would be bad all around, for everyone involved. Her status as the mage Mordio held little to no weight here. Not on a Malkuth vessel. They didn't rely on blastia, after all.

"... you threatening them, old man?"

Raven had to blink for a moment, usually, that was the nickname Yuri reserved for him, but this time, the ex-Imperial Knight was addressing Colonel Curtiss. He studied the soldier, that nigh ageless, bespectacled face. Those crimson eyes. Yes, he was certain … his memory may not be as great as it used to be, but this Jade of Malkuth was undoubtedly the same Jade … Jade the Necromancer.

But the Necromancer looked so … harmless. Even so, Raven knew, looks … were not everything.

"At the moment, no, but that depends entirely on their actions." Folding his arms behind his back, Jade addressed the two royals. "Well? Are you open to the idea of cooperating with us on this much? It would be for both our best interests, at least, at the moment."

Estelle was fidgeting, uncertain. Who could blame her? She wasn't very well versed in things like politics, and it was no accident that this was the case. The Council wanted a puppet, a figurehead, a ruler with no actual power. A sheltered, naïve, uninformed princess was the perfect imperial candidate for that purpose.

Nothing like Princess Natalia …

Luke answered in her stead. "I am. It falls to me to keep Lady Estellise safe, no matter what. As an Imperial Knight, it's also my job to protect the citizens of the Empire of Kimlasca-Lanvaldear. I can't say no, even if I didn't care about my own safety."

No one wanted to die.

Not the Malkuth soldiers, not the people of Mantaic, not the Knights, not the guilds, not … not Luke.

"Then it's settled. The Tartarus will berth at Mantaic's borders, and we'll arrange to contact Commandant Alexei of the Kimlascan Imperial Knights to have this taken care of before we head into Akzeriuth to evacuate the citizenry."

Just like that, it was decided. The Colonel left the cabin, to attend to his ship, leaving everyone else. Ion sat at the table, making himself comfortable, and Anise followed suit, though as his guardian, she maintained an air of vigilance. Luke wasn't very impressed, though, Anise appeared to be just a kid. A kid guarding a kid, huh …?

Yuri, meanwhile, was fuming. What did this mean for Brave Vesperia and its job of escorting Estelle in the Sands to find Phaeroh for her? For her to find out what the bird thing meant when it called her an insipid poison? Who she really was? She couldn't sit in the Zaphias castle after hearing something like that, she'd said it, and decided it, for herself. And yet, circumstance—was it fate—forced its hand.

He didn't like it. He hated it. Why did this have to happen? Why couldn't Estelle be able to find out something about herself? Why did they have to get swept up in this whole mess? Yeah, he must be cursed, definitely …

He looked up when he heard footfalls; Guy had stood, opening the cabin door. With Jade's leave, the party was allowed anywhere on the Tartarus, except for those rooms containing military secrets. The blond swordsman, so reminiscent of Flynn, turned toward Yuri.

"I'm going to get some air, if anyone wants to join me."

Oh, what the hell. Yuri stood, and followed Guy out on deck, Repede padding along in his wake.

* * *

Guy had gotten straight to the point once they were out on deck, away from other people. The sun and breeze felt nice, even for all the dust and sand of the desert. Yuri didn't know whether he should be appalled at this almost Scifoesque trait; they were similar, but there was something inexolerably … different about this man. They were around the same age, as far as he figured, but there was something about Guy that separated him from Flynn, as much as a chasm separated the ends of a bridge.

"How well do you know Luke?"

Yuri gave a half shrug, his arms folded across his chest.

"Pretty well, I think, well, for as much as we'd been traveling together, so far."

Guy drummed his fingers in a quick, restless rhythm along the deck railing. It was warm outside, with desert sands carried on the gusts of wind. Hot, sandy, and dusty. The servant didn't look at Yuri, kept those baby blues looking out to the horizon. Up close, Lowell could see the differences between this man, and Captain Scifo.

Flynn was young. Not just in body, but, in the ways of the world. Still kind of, well, innocent. Not like Estelle, that was another story entirely (and knowing her, it would take _several _stories to tell the tale), but Guy … just from looking at him, this close, Yuri could tell, the world had shaped and cut and ground Guy into the man he was today.

Whatever kind of man that may be.

"Did Luke tell you about his kidnapping, or memory loss, from seven years ago?"

Yuri blinked, taken aback. He scratched his hairline, thinking, remembering all the times he'd talked to Luke, that the Royal Guardsman had talked to him, and when they fought together, or argued, or … just anything, really. After a few long moments, he shook his head.

"He may have mentioned it, but he hasn't actually told me any of this, no." He crossed his arms, the belt and scabbard for his sword hanging off his wrist. Lowell faced Cecil dead on, granite grey eyes matched up to icy blue. That was yet another difference that struck Yuri. Flynn's eyes were more like sea water. Most times they could be gentle, but when he got fierce, so did his eyes, especially his eyes. Guy's eyes … they were blue, too, but they reminded him more of a jagged, sharp shard of solid ice.

Something had happened to Guy, a long time ago, that had the potential to twist and warp him into something … dark. Twisted. Ugly.

Yuri knew this, because he'd seen the same thing in his own mirror.

Guy turned around, so his back was to the railing. He leaned against it, elbows resting on the metal, one leg crossed over another. Completely relaxed. Like Yuri, he dressed simply, but unlike Yuri, he dressed with more care for what he did—he had a jacket over his shirt (Yuri, shirts, what's that now?), and gloves and boots, with pants that fit to his form—he expected to run around and get dirty. Yuri … Yuri didn't really care too much about his clothes, either for looks, or by practicality.

He guessed servants would know what to mind, whether they were minding themselves, or some noble.

"Well, seven years ago, he'd been kidnapped, by the Malkuth Empire. He was recovered, but he didn't remember anything. The doctors checked him out, couldn't find anything wrong, and had him start keeping a journal, in case he lost his memories again."

Yuri quirked a brow, he hadn't a clue on any of this. A kidnapping? Memory loss? That—that was the reason for the journal he kept scrawling in, like a busybody? He _had _thought it, well, odd, that such a high ranking member of the Imperial Knights, one of royal blood, at that, would keep something like that. It made stealing sensitive information so easy, just like that time Yuri himself had swiped the diary, and read that Alexei had ordered Luke to procure something called an apatheia.

_Wait a minute … didn't the old man say something about the Don wanting him to find apatheia, too?_

"Okay, Guy, so what does this have to do with … anything? So he can't remember his past. He doesn't seem to need one, he's doing just fine now."

For a moment, a look of surprise fleeted across Guy's face. Then he laughed. It wasn't a joyous, happy laugh. It was a wry, sardonic one. Like he felt something, or someone, was laughing at him.

"That's exactly what he told me. I asked him if not remembering anything bothered him. He said, 'you can't go forward if you keep looking back.' So he didn't need a past."

Yuri tilted his head to one side. "Huh. How 'bout that. Guess there's nobles that aren't so bad, after all."

"You don't like nobility?" The servant straightened up, hands on his hips. Maybe it was a swordsman's habit, but Yuri didn't really like the way his hand had rested so very easily on the hilt of his blade.

Lowell shook his head. "Not fond of them, in any case. The Royal Quarter in the capital was right next to the Lower Quarter, and a few missing blastia cores, they didn't even blink at an eye at. When losing just one is enough to throw the Lower Quarter into chaos. The nobles, especially the ones in Cumore's brigade … they didn't care. Magistrate Ragou, in Capua Nor, he's a high ranking noble on the Council, and he was isolating his people, and feeding them to monsters."

Guy grimaced. He looked as if he were about to be sick, and rightly so. "Ragou … he's dead, though, isn't he? Like that Yeager man said, they found his body not too far from Dahngrest."

"... yeah, he's dead. Doesn't surprise me, the guildsmen of Dahngrest can be an unruly bunch, even those who're in the Union. The Don has a hell of a time keeping them in line."

For a few long moments, they just stood there, on deck. The desert sun beating down on the Tartarus, still making its way through the shifting Sands of Kogorh. The hot wind, bringing with it grains of sand that dug into their skin, already roughened from exposure to the elements. Something lay between Cecil and Lowell, something they mutually understood, and it was more than one thing.

Swordsmanship, strength of body, strength of will, resolve, loss, inner turmoils, their own personal struggles to decide on which border to stand: the deep darkness, or the bright light. How much of their own selves they retained, or whether they'd already lost them, skewed like the reflection seen in a broken mirror.

Guy's voice was low, almost inaudible.

"You killed him."

"... yeah. I did."

There was no point in trying to hide it. Yuri knew full well what he was doing, when he saw Ragou on the bridge that night in Dahngrest. He knew exactly what he was doing, what he wanted to do, when he drew his sword, and plunged it through the cowardly snake's heart—if the little shriveled organ that pumped blood could be called a heart.

"... when Luke first tried coming to terms with killing people outside the barriers, I told him: outside the cities, the barriers, killing people isn't considered a crime, as long as it wasn't for personal reasons. And, then, in the Knights, he was going to have to kill people, whether it was by his own hand, or of those under his command. I'd just said … he was going to have to get used to it."

Yuri's mouth was flattened in a grim line. He wasn't about to talk much about Ragou—why he did it was plain as day, and Guy hadn't started this conversation to talk about Yuri. It was about Luke. And for all he and Luke had a bit of a tough time getting along here or there, they were still friends of a sort, and this may be Yuri's only window into the kind of stuff that made Luke who he was.

"I'd say he's used to it. The way he's fought, it's a little frightening. I haven't seen anyone in the Knights fight like that."

"Yeah, they wouldn't." Guy replied, and he relaxed a little, but he still stood rigidly. "Not everyone in the Knights was personally trained by the Commandant of the Oracle Knights."

The Oracle Knights. Those were a military that didn't mess around. They knew what they were doing, and they worked together flawlessly. They easily put the Imperial Knights, and the guilds, to shame, as an organized, militant force. From what he'd seen of the Malkuth army, they weren't too shabby themselves, but the Oracle Knights … they were another level entirely.

Yuri went on, looking down at the deck he stood on. "He hates it. He wants to save people, in ways that don't involve killing them. I think he might admire Estelle, because she doesn't need to do what he does, and can save people just by being there."

Guy rubbed at his wrist, it was one of his uncomfortable tells. "Yeah, that's impossible. He can use the Seventh Fonon, so he could learn to heal, or with blastia, I don't know the specifics about bodhi blastia, but even if he learned to heal, the fact remains, the world doesn't work that way."

"So what if it doesn't?" Yuri shot back, glaring up at Guy. "Why is it that you Imperials seem to want to do nothing but cut and drag Luke and Estelle down, with whatever they want to do, whatever they try to do, is it ever not good enough?!"

Oh, that was _it. _Guy was angry now. He stood up straight, tall, and took a single step toward Yuri. The intent in his movements, Lowell wouldn't have been surprised if swords were drawn. They weren't, all Guy did was stand there, but he stood, staring him in the eye, and Yuri saw the depths of what made him a dangerous man to have an as an enemy.

Cecil's voice was low, harsh. "You don't understand a thing. When Luke lost his memory, I was the one who looked after him. He didn't remember how to _walk. _He didn't remember _his parents' faces. _How to _talk. _How to _eat. _How to do things that people like you and I take for granted. He was completely lost, and alone—alone, except for me. He depended on me, and I did my best, but even I couldn't help him through everything. Even less after he became a Knight, and I had to enter Princess Natalia's service instead of remaining in his. He wouldn't need an attendant, in the Knights. When Princess Natalia sent me to search for Luke, I stopped at nothing to find him. And it was a damn good thing I didn't."

That was right—Guy had miraculously appeared, just in time, to save Luke from what would've otherwise been a fatal wound, with the Leviathan's Claw assassins in the Weasand of Cados. That was timing of the divine intervention caliber. Yuri opened his mouth to reply, but the other man continued as if he weren't about to speak.

"You think you know what's best for Luke, you think you understand him, but you don't. You don't have a clue. Don't you go doing anything stupid, to make Luke's life harder than it is already."

Yuri frowned. He did not appreciate being spoken to this way. He had enough people on his back over the years, hell, Flynn was still on his back, even if they didn't see each other as much as they used to. He stepped up to Guy, staring him dead on. They were almost nose to nose.

"If you're talking about how Luke's mentioned in the Score, yeah, I know about that. And that doesn't mean _shit. _What some woman said a few thousand years ago has no meaning in the world of today, when people die, and no one _cares. _When an innocent girl isn't even allowed to go outside for a walk. When a boy is pushed into things he isn't sure he wants. When knight captains make under the table deals with scumbag guildsmen to smuggle weapons around, and lie to honest, hardworking people to get their free labor."

Guy wasn't afraid, he stood unflinching, but he didn't like what Yuri was saying, and it appeared to the ex-Knight that he didn't like Yuri himself, either. This was the first time they'd really spoken, and they were already tense, and on edge. Whenever Flynn had gotten angry with him, that at least was an honest anger, one born out of care, of concern for his best friend.

Guy and Yuri were not friends. Whether that was even possible was up in the air.

"Luke's mentioned in Yulia's Score?"

"Yeah. Didn't you know? Apparently she knew he was going to be born, and he's supposed to bring prosperity to the Empire." Yuri snorted. "I stopped believing in fortunetelling before I was ten years old."

There was a cold, sharp edge in Guy's voice. "Yulia's Score has never been wrong. Not once." His frigidly blue eyes narrowed. "What did the Score say? Did he recite it, word for word?"

Now Yuri was annoyed. He turned away, getting more and more impatient, a hand on his waist. "Does it matter if it's word for word? And how would you know anything about the Score, no one but certain high ranking Knights and nobles knew anything about it, and the Empire's been isolated from the rest of the world!"

"It _does _matter! And I served House Fabre, a House tied to the imperial families of Heurassein, and Landvaldear, and later, the House of Lanvaldear. You'd be surprised what a 'mere servant' hears."

Yuri opened his mouth to retort, when a man silenced him. Both he and Guy were startled, and turned to look at none other than Colonel Jade Curtiss. The servant didn't say anything, and the guildsman clenched a fist. Just how long had that damnable fonist been standing there?

"I'll appreciate it if you wouldn't fight aboard the Tartarus." He had his hands in his pockets, but the relaxed posture didn't fool Yuri one bit. Lowell didn't trust anybody on board this damn landship, and he sure as hell didn't trust Guy, either. The Colonel spoke, calmly. "Now, what's this about a kidnapping? This doesn't sound very pleasant."

"Seven years ago, the Malkuth Empire kidnapped Luke fon Fabre, and he lost his memory as a result, Colonel Curtiss." Cecil said, standing up straight. It was eerily reminiscent of how stiffly Flynn stood, when he was clearly agitated.

Jade tilted his head to one side, as if he didn't quite understand. "If perpetrators of Malkuth are indeed responsible, I'm afraid I don't know anything about it." Then, in an almost inaudible tone—Yuri only heard because he was good at picking out certain noises, or lack thereof—he spoke again: "... 'memory loss' … could it be …?"

He didn't know what to think right now. The downtown Zaphian groaned, it just seemed like he was getting progressively angrier, and angrier, and just even more frustrated as the days went by. He wanted to round on Jade, to demand what was going on, why was this kidnapping important, what was so significant about the amnesia, but he never got the chance.

"Whoa!"

"Hold steady! … this isn't good."

Before he knew it, he was floored on deck. The landship had shaken, violently. Guy had grabbed onto the railing to keep himself from falling overboard, and Jade hadn't so much as stumbled. Yuri rolled over, jumping to his feet, nearby, Repede had fallen, but the dog leapt back up, barking in warning, the hackles on his back raised the highest Yuri remembered seeing them.

"Repede, what's wrong?"

The answer came in the form of none other than the God-General, Sync the Tempest. The soldier dropped from the sky—were those winged monsters Yuri saw—and in a flurry of barehanded blows, blasted Repede aside, and kicked Yuri hard in the ribs.

"When did they—ow!" Yuri stumbled backward, throwing the scabbard off his sword, barely blocking another strike. Sync struck quick and true, stopping at nothing, and for all his hands and feet were bare but for gloves and boots, there was an undeniable, unearthly power behind the strikes—were these fonons? It was different from attacks that utilized aer. It … cut more, than aer did, aer just felt forceful.

Behind Sync, Guy stepped close, drawing his blade across the boy's back. He stumbled, but he'd dropped to the deck and rolled out of the way, he had been wounded, but not seriously, the cut was shallow.

"Huh, not too shabby, for a servant." Sync dusted himself off as he rose, and for all his eyes were hidden behind the mask, they could see the cruel smirk, and not knowing at whom he looked was even more unsettling. He cracked his knuckles. "Much better than that idiot over there. Hard to believe he lasted very long at all in Nordopolica. Yeah, I think I could use you."

"You're not using anyone!" Yuri shouted, throwing an Azure Storm at the God-General. Kid or not, he was annoying, dangerous, and—and—_sick._ Laughing, Sync ducked and dodged the blastia attacks, weaving around to charge at Guy, an ominous glow in his hands.

There was a flash of light over Yuri's shoulder—Jade was standing there—and there was blood splattering on deck.

* * *

When the Tartarus shook, Luke knew something was bad. He drew his sword, marching out into the hallway, and sure enough, a bunch of Oracle Knights had run through, barreling straight for him. Without missing too much of a beat, he raised his shield and rammed the first soldier down, slicing the next one with an elemental strike arte.

Judith and Raven had stepped out and helped dispatch of the other soldiers that got past Luke. When the skirmish was over, the Fabre straightened up, sheathing his sword.

"What the hell's happening? Why are Oracle Knights ..."

Raven fired off an arrow—it whizzed past Luke's face, and he blinked, surprised—and embedded itself deeply into the shoulder of the woman who had just emerged into the corridor. One of her handguns dropped with a resounding _clang_ on the floor.

Legretta the Quick, with practiced deftness, pulled the arrow out of her shoulder, knit up the injury with a Seventh Fonist's healing arte, and recovered her fallen weapon, making sure to deliver a hail of bullets directed at Raven. The guildsman blocked and parried with his transform bow collapsed in sword form, stepping backward.

"They're prolly after ya, dearie."

"Again? Man ..."

Judith vaulted across the hallway, striking at Legretta, who jumped backward, firing as she did. The Krityan rolled out of the way, but not without a bullet grazing her shoulder. Luke dashed forward, gathering up fonons for another altered strike arte.

Trying to engage the Quick in close quarters was a mistake that Luke was likely to never forget.

It happened so fast: she kicked at his throat, not breaking anything, but it had him reeling enough to drop his sword, and then she grabbed him and forced him down to the floor, twisting his now empty sword hand behind his back, a handgun barrel pointed to the back of his head.

Judith had had her spear raised, and Raven, an arrow drawn back on the bowstring.

"I would advise against any further attacks, if you value Captain Fabre's life."

"That's real funny, lady. Yer an Oracle Knight. Don'tchu guys have to uphold the Score? If you kill him, you'd be screwing around with your precious prophecy." Raven hadn't lowered his bow, but he had relaxed the string, though the arrow remained nocked.

She glared, and at once, Judith turned her weapon down, and whispered to Raven, "She's serious. Put your bow down." Nothing in Legretta's body language indicated any sign of relaxing or backing on her word, she had the gun aimed at Luke's head, and she _would _shoot. The Altosk guildsman grumbled, but he took the arrow from the string, and lowered the bow.

Captain Fabre, meanwhile, was hoping that no one did anything stupid to provoke Legretta into shooting him. It wasn't that he didn't trust them—far from it, as fighting alongside them, he had entrusted his life in their hands for months—it was the God-General he didn't trust. First Asch, now Legretta, and Largo and Sync had attacked, as well.

Luke _really _did not like the God-Generals.

The cabin door slammed open, and into the corridor poured out others of the party. Luke couldn't see, but he heard Anise's voice, Rita's, too (not so much her voice, just as … her presence, it felt like). There was a lot of noise and confused words, he hoped Karol wasn't out here, but if Estelle were out here, he'd have to smack a few people around once the situation was dealt with.

"Oh, no! Luke!"

_Of fucking course._

Legretta sounded almost amused. "The Child of the Full Moon, onboard the Tartarus? This is unexpected, but we have no need for Alexei's puppets. Where's Fon Master Ion?"

"None of your business!" Anise shot back, and her tone surprised Luke. She'd looked and sounded like a normal, giggly girl, but then again, she _was _an Oracle Knight, and the Fon Master's guard. Like he, she was a soldier. There was no messing around when the lives of others were involved, politically valuable or not.

Raven held his hands up, inwardly cursing to himself—if the Fon Master Guardian wouldn't pipe down, she might cost them Luke's life. "Hey, brat, shut up for a minute." He kept his eyes trained on Legretta, nope, she wasn't firing, but her fingers did not move. She could very well shoot at any moment. "Tha Fon Master's in this cabin here. You guys planning to kill your own boss?" He moved aside from the door, indicating the others to do the same. There was no budging at first, but a bark from him, and some herding on Judith's part, the way was cleared.

"You can't do this, old man, you're not an Oracle Knight! I'm not letting Ion-"

"Listen, pipsqueak, I've been fighting a lot longer than you have, and you are _not _costing us a life because you can't shut your trap."

Oh. _That _shut Anise up.

"I'm sorry for the trouble, please listen to Raven, Anise. I'd rather there weren't any killings because of me." Ion himself stepped out of the cabin, no weapons, just himself in his green Order of Lorelei robes and mantle, the golden Yulian tuning fork glimmering from his neck. "I'll go with the God-Generals."

Legretta did not let Luke go—not until Ion had stepped across the lines, and behind her. She shoved Luke away, and he'd stumbled, a bit disoriented. He almost fell backward, but to his surprise, Raven caught and steadied him. Once the Fon Master was with her, Legretta left, however, she did not turn her back on the enemy, and kept her eyes fixed on them, guns aimed to shoot opposition, until more Oracle soldiers surged in to meet her.

Then, she, and Ion, were gone.

The first ones to say anything were Rita, and Anise. Their simultaneous rage was a bit … impressive.

"I can't believe that hag took Ion away! I'll kill those bastards myself!"

"I'm going to wring the necks of every Oracle soldier I see on this ship if they don't get the hell off it!"

Anise looked up at Rita, a surprised but not displeased look on her face. "Hey're you're a Kimlascan Imperial mage, right? I like the way you think."

Mordio was already cracking her knuckles. "I can't stand people who think they can do whatever they want, just because they can fight. Well, guess, what, we can fight, too!"

"Sounds like Ion was all they wanted, and if they wanted to kill him, they'd have done it already." Luke finally spoke up, breaking the uncomfortable silence that had followed after Rita's words. He looked to Anise. "Anise, right? I'm sorry this happened, but as long as Ion's alive, that's good enough." The guardian puffed up, looking ready to go off again, but if she were, she didn't get the chance.

That was when Luke noticed something. He blinked, surprised, and then, the fear set in.

"Hey … where's Guy? And Yuri? They weren't in the cabin ..."

Raven scratched the back of his head.

"I hate to be the bearer o'bad news, dearie, but … they both went out on deck a while ago, to get some fresh air."

"That means ..."

"They were on deck when the Oracle Knights attacked."

* * *

Yuri blinked awake. He was lying on his side, by a wall. As his vision blurred in and out of focus, he recognized the metal railing in front of him, the golden Sands of Kogorh in the backdrop. There was a huge, blurry, black shape, with white … on the desert sand. Little dots were hovering in the sky above it. Rubbing his eyes, and his head, he jolted upright, realizing what he was looking at.

"That's an Oracle landship?" Yep, it wasn't all that different from the Tartarus—black body bordered in gold, and white sails. The dots—he made a face—they were flying monsters, and he made out just enough from down here to see that Oracle soldiers were being ferried from the Oracle ship to the Malkuth one.

Monsters, the Oracle Knights used monsters? The Hunting Blades were going to have a field day.

Yuri sat up, groggily getting to his feet, taking a breath to wait for the dizziness to subside. What happened? The last thing he remembered was Sync charging at Guy, there was a flash of light, and blood …

_Blood._

His eyes dropped to the deck. There were dark red splotches on his boots, probably on his clothes, too. There was a trail of red on the ground, getting progressively more profuse, thicker … redder … bodies on the ground. He rushed up to them, stopped short by Jade's arm. Jade—the Colonel was alive, standing before Yuri, and as calm as ever.

"Stand down, they're alive."

"They-?"

Yes, they. Guy and Sync were lying on the deck, blood splattered on their clothes, on the ground. Guy's arm was cut—was that just more blood Yuri saw, or was there something else on the wound? While Sync's shoulder had been impaled, by what, he had no idea. It hadn't seemed to do very much damage, though.

Jade pushed Yuri back, that same flash of light appearing—the one Yuri saw before he'd fallen down—and a spear appeared in the Colonel's hands. Huh. That was new. Judy just had to lug her own spear around.

Sync had pounced from the deck (it really _was _like a pounce, Yuri would remark later) to attack Jade, who had just blocked it, protecting Yuri in the same movement. Guildsman or not, he was still a civilian, it was the duty and obligation of soldiers to protect them.

The God-General was laughing. Even as he was wounded, he was laughing. It had nothing on Zagi's laughs, but it was eerily reminiscent all the same.

"Wow, you're a force to be reckoned with, Necromancer, even without your fonic artes."

"I don't exactly rely on my fonic artes alone. What have you done to Guy?"

"Idiot's alive, ain't he? You'll find out soon enough."

It might be argued that Yuri's next action was against better judgment. This was assuming Yuri Lowell had _any _kind of proper judgment at all. He gripped his sword, pushed past Jade, and attacked Sync. It was obvious that the wound Jade gave him had him slip up a little, but the Tempest was no fool, he kept his distance, slinging a Third fonic arte—though Yuri could only equate it to a wind magic arte. The Turbulence threw Yuri backward, where he fell to the deck.

Jade had taken this time to cast a fonic arte of his own—an Energy Blast. Sync tried to dodge, but he couldn't completely escape it. He let out a curse, falling to his knees. Colonel Curtiss brandished his spear, darting forward to kill the God-General.

Despite himself—_in spite of himself—_Yuri found himself shouting.

"He's just a kid!"

It hadn't shaken Jade's focus any; Sync wasn't one to just sit and surrender, with a fistful of Second Fonons, he blocked and countered the spearhead with an arcane arte. Even though the Tartarus had no earth on it, rocks and stone erupted from where Sync jumped. Yuri had seen magic and altered artes work similarly, but it was just now dawning on him. This was the kind of sheer raw power these fonons possessed—and they needed no bodhi blastia.

_Flynn … did you think this was what the world was like, outside the barriers?_

* * *

A/N: Ending it here, I originally thought to write more, but this seemed like a good place to end this chapter.


End file.
